The Day's dull Catalog
by thisloser
Summary: Set during the timeskip. Summary: After being defeated by Itachi, Kakashi knows he needs to get stronger. If only people would stop interfering.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** The Day's Dull Catalog

**Disclaimer:** Masashi Kishimoto owns Naruto. I make no profit with this (like I even could...). Title "borrowed" from a poem by Paul Guest.

**Rating:** early chapters T, higher rating later on

**Warnings:** slash (meaning m/m romance), some violence, language

**Note:** reuploaded because someone asked me to. Reviews are appreciated but not necessary.

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><p>Kakashi had spent the better part of his free day lying on his bed, rereading "Icha Icha Paradise" – he had just finished the latest installment of the series and planned to start it all over, because he clearly needed to read all three of them in order a second (and possibly a third and fourth) time to get the full effect of the highly complex and intellectual material (as he pointed out to anyone who had the nerve to ask why he was still reading the same books) – and trying to conveniently "forget" about his meeting with Gai, which the other jounin had scheduled for them the day before, upon finding out that they both had no missions (Kakashi would have to investigate sometime, exactly who regularly told his self-proclaimed rival about his missions or lack thereof. Also, recently their days off had started to co-occur more frequently than not. He was beginning to suspect a conspiracy of some sort). Of course, Kakashi had long since learned that forgetting about Gai would not save him from the challenge. Nothing short of a village emergency would.<p>

As a consequence he resigned himself to show up at their meeting point probably no more than about twenty minutes later than he had reluctantly agreed to the previous day. And so he went, book in one hand, the other in his pocket, the same relaxed pose he always used to annoy Gai just a little bit more, in case his tardiness alone should not be upsetting enough.

They met on one of the training grounds. Gai had actually made proper reservations for the occasion, instead of just scaring away some poor inexperienced chuunin with his hot-blooded attitude. By the time he arrived, though Kakashi could tell that his rival was just about to lose his youthfully patient composure and embark on a search for him. Maybe he had been a tad too relaxed on his way over from his apartment complex; his friend certainly seemed to think so.

"Eternal Rival! You´re late! By forty-three minutes and twelve seconds!" Kakashi met the typical outburst with a shrug.

"Well, you know how it is, Gai... There was this baby panda stuck in a tree and they´re rare, so I had to–"

He interrupted himself then and contemplated the taijutsu expert´s expression. Gai´s eyebrows were drawn together, it looked almost like two big black caterpillars were meeting on his forehead to share some extra juicy piece of gossip and he was narrowing his eyes, while slowly clenching and unclenching his fists. Years of being the green beast´s eternal rival had taught Kakashi (among other things) to recognize the first signs of an impending hour-long speech about the proper decorum of a true and honourable shinobi.

In short, he was quite aware that, if he didn´t distract Gai now, he would not only have to do the challenge, but also have to listen to his friend lecturing him on the evils of being late and making up false excuses. There was only so much even a jounin could take (in fact Kakashi had been wondering for a while now why Ibiki had never thought of employing Gai in his department, it seemed like such a waste of talent).

"I´m sorry for wasting your time like this, Gai-kun", he said, smiling his sweetest smile under the mask and raising his hands level with his chest, his palms facing Gai in the same gesture one might use to calm a terrified panda bear, desperately clinging to a treebrach high above the ground and with no idea how he got there in the first place.

"You know, if you have something else to do now, we can postpone the challenge, or since it´s my fault for being so late, I could just forfeit and you get the point. How does that sound?"

"KAKASHI! " Gai exclaimed, truly scandalized and already forgetting his friend´s other crimes, "We are tied at 57 wins each, I refuse to take the lead without a proper match! It would render the whole score meaningless! Our Eternal Rivalry cannot be treated with such disrespect!"

The Copy Ninja sighed. He knew that he ultimately had no choice but to give in, so he figured he might as well do it before the other Jounin got to the crying and hugging part of his routine.

"Alright, alright", he said "it´s your turn to pick the challenge, so let´s get this over with."

They agreed on a taijutsu match (Kakashi suspected that this had been Gai´s intention to begin with, since it would explain why he had wanted to meet on the training grounds in the first place), for which Kakashi was endlessly grateful, as it was his favourite kind of challenge. Well, second favourite if he counted rock, paper, scissors, but he had not tried to pick that one anymore, because the last time he had suggested it, Gai had nearly burst into tears and claimed that it brought back the all too painful memories of Lee´s injury and the risky surgery.

Kakashi had let his friend get away with it, since even he had to admit that their rivalry – of course he only used the term ironically – would become a little boring if half of their matches were games of rock, paper and scissors. At any rate, a taijutsu match with Gai as his opponent was definitely a good chance for some real training and chances like that were quite rare for a Jounin teacher without a team of students.

These days all the training Kakashi managed to squeeze in between missions were solo sessions, as far from any potential interruptions as possible and solely designed to improve his Sharingan. These sessions were spent concentrating in silence, and afterwards he would have no choice but to lie down for a few hours to make the piercing headache subside.

Training with Gai was about as different from his work on eye techniques as things could get.

Kakashi was constantly moving, not even noticing the voices that carried over from the adjoining training grounds, too focused on tracking Gai´s movement, which was as fast as usual.

Incredibly fast. Just in time he managed to block a kick aimed at his chest with both arms, but he couldn´t completely break its force and was pushed back a few meters against the trunk of a tree, which was subsequently reduced to splinters by the green beast´s notorious right fist. The Copy Ninja had already leapt aside though, and was smirking as wide and as tauntingly at his friend as he could. Sometimes it was really quite a shame that he wore a mask, but he comforted himself with the knowledge that Gai had been his comrade long enough to be able to read most of his expressions despite it. And in case he had missed it, there were even more fun ways to tease him.

"My, my, you´re as lively as ever!" he called and fished his book out of his pocket, "Keep this up and you´re going to make me lose my place."

Gai, who had paused for a moment to see whether his rival was going to start a counterattack, growled and charged again.

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><p>They had to call it a draw. It was not a surprising outcome for their challenge, in fact it was how most of their taijutsu matches ended, since going all out in a mock battle was not an option and fighting until someone touched the ground with any other body part than their feet could take some time if the opponents were both experienced Jounin. But the longer the fight went on, the higher the risk that they accidentally injured themselves or each other grew and the village couldn´t spare them, therefore they always set a time limit for their matches. This time it had run out before anyone had lost, and while Kakashi sat down under one of the few trees, which had survived their fight, Gai started to do the 500 one armed push-ups he had promised to do if he failed the challenge.<p>

"You didn´t lose, you know, it was a draw. " Kakashi leaned back against the tree trunk and lovingly tried to smooth the cracked spine of his poor Icha Icha Paradise. Gai didn´t even look up at that, he was counting backwards from 500 under his breath, but somewhere around 467 he sighed and said "I didn´t win, Eternal Rival."

The Copy Ninja carefully slipped the book back into his pocket and fastened his gaze on the other Jounin, just watching his rhythmic workout for a few of his heartbeats, which almost seemed synchronized with Gai´s repetitive exertions. It was strangely hypnotic. He shook his head a little to snap out of it – whatever _it_ was - and then said more testily than he had planned "Well, you can´t always win." The green beast went on for a while as if he had heard neither the answer, nor the irritated tone of voice in which it was given.

At 250 he switched to his right arm and said calmly, still not looking up from the grass, "But I must always try my best anyway. That´s what you´re doing, too. Isn´t it?"

_Even if it kills me, _Kakashi thought. "Did Tsunade-sama put you up to this?" he asked. Gai's troubled look told him the answer. Kakashi had better do something to put him – them – at ease. "I know exactly what I´m doing. I´m fine, Gai," he said.

The "exactly" was maybe a little too much. It earned him a Look from his friend, and Kakashi took the hint. If it didn´t convince _Gai_, then trying it on the Fifth would be a _very_ bad idea indeed.

"She didn´t... Well, not directly..." If Gai blushed any more, he would have to start calling himself Konoha's Noble Crimson Beast. Kakashi waited, he knew that Gai was almost physically incapable of lying to his friends; he simply despised it too much. "Okay, maybe she did it directly. But you have to understand our concern for you, Eternal Rival! You are important for this village! Tsunade-sama only wanted me to make sure that you don´t overdo your Sharingan-training. Those eye techniques are highly strenuous and there is very little information about their side effects on the user, because the clan kept it secret. We just want you to be careful. Also, you have been isolating yourself lately..."

Gai had to interrupt himself; his voice had gotten thinner and reedier with every word; he was getting down to the last ten push-ups and needed his breath.

So much for his conspiracy theories, then. Kakashi didn´t know whether he should feel touched by their concern or annoyed that the Hokage herself felt the need to single him out and assign Gai of all people to be his watchdog. He already had eight of those, nagging him to take care of himself. He didn´t need Gai making puppy eyes at him as well. And yet, this was what he got.

Meanwhile Gai had finished his self-imposed punishment, he collapsed on the grass, lay there panting for a short moment, then rolled onto his back and finally sat up facing Kakashi, who had had enough time to decide that he really was irritated with the other man.

"How many gates can you open, Gai?" he asked in a low voice, fully aware that he was crossing a line. Gai was clearly startled, but there was no outburst, no sound at all, apart from the tiniest intake of breath, no movement, except for a flicker of the eyes. It wasn´t the first time Kakashi had witnessed the change which occurred to Gai whenever the Gates were mentioned, the sudden stillness that came over him, a strange calm, much like the eerie peace before a vicious storm or the quiet in the eye of a tornado, Kakashi could never tell which was the more fitting simile.

Gai remained uncharacteristically silent. He sat cross-legged with his hands folded in his lap and his eyes cast down, seemingly lost in thought. When he finally met his friend´s eye and spoke, his usually loud voice was quiet and strangely devoid of emotion.

"I apologize. I have no right to question your judgment. I will tell Tsunade-sama that you are only doing what you think best for the village."

Having said that, Gai rose slowly and turned to leave.

It was exactly the reaction Kakashi had aimed for. He would be able to do what he had to, he wouldn´t be bothered by anyone´s misguided concern anymore, and as an extra special bonus Gai would probably leave him alone for the next few days- maybe even weeks – too. It was perfect.

But either perfection wasn´t all it was cracked up to be anymore, or Tsunade´s worries really had been justified and his training had severely damaged his brain after all, because after ten weeks of what Kakashi would have expected to be blessed lack of attention from Gai, he actually felt some strange longing for one of those weird challenges to break his endless mission, training, another mission, more training and so on-routine.

However, Kakashi didn´t plan to be the one to make the first move. It had been Gai who had broken their unspoken rules about discussing certain taboo topics in the first place; all he had done was to reestablish the boundaries. That Gai chose to feel hurt and pout over something like this wasn´t really surprising, considering his sometimes childish temper, but it was stupid all the same.

Anyway, Kakashi expected Gai to fold in the very near future, he simply wasn´t one to carry grudges and usually suffered more than the person he was angry with, because he simply craved harmony and mutual understanding, while other – more mature – people, like Kakashi himself for example, could live happily without any human contact at all for a long time, as long as they had a good book, even longer if it happened to be a good, filthy book.

His porn hadn´t kept him from confronting the Fifth, though (surprisingly, because it usually kept him from doing all kinds of unpleasant things. It was very convenient in that respect). In hindsight, it hadn´t been a good idea to pop into the Hokage´s office through the window, but since Kakashi hadn´t made an appointment for his visit, there was no way to actually be too late, so he had to show his defiance of the system in some other way and the book of porn alone just didn´t cut it anymore. If he thought about it, maybe the talk with Tsunade was another reason why he didn´t want to talk to Gai, although he knew that he would have to eventually, his last conversation about that particular subject had not exactly gone well.

Even remembering it was uncomfortable.

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><p>Tsunade was not pleased.<p>

She had been in the middle of what was officially a highly classified – no personal assistants allowed! – meeting with several ANBU team leaders, but what in truth had been a drinking and gambling session. Kakashi effectively ruined her little party with his sudden appearance at the window, which led to a scramble for masks and weapons all around (the ANBU part had been true). Unfortunately the ensuing ruckus made Shizune assume that her Hokage was in danger and therefore she disregarded her prior orders and stormed in, ready to defend her mistress with her life if she had to.

It took the assembled ANBU about a quarter of a second to realize that there was no actual source of danger - just a source of annoyance – and though there were a few irritated murmurs, no one stopped Kakashi from climbing in with a small, friendly wave and an unfazed "Yo!" It took Shizune a little longer to fully grasp the situation. Her gaze travelled slowly from Kakashi on the opposite side of the room to its middle where Tsunade sat cross-legged on the floor in front of her desk. The Hokage forced a smile in an attempt to distract her assistant from the frantic movements of her hands which were trying to grab all evidence of the meeting´s true purpose and quickly shove it out of sight. A task that proved to be impossible, even for a legendary member of the sannin. Telltale bottles of sake were standing and lying around, some had been knocked over thanks to Kakashi´s surprise visit and cards and coins were scattered everywhere.

Shizune took it all in.

"Um, well, if this meeting is concluded, Hokage-sama, we should probably head back to-"the ANBU abruptly stopped when he caught a glimpse of Shizune´s expression.

Her left eyebrow twitched.

Six elite black ops members held their breaths.

Her nostrils flared.

Tsunade grimaced, at once realizing the futility of her efforts.

Shizune´s lips parted.

Kakashi edged back towards the open window.

When the dust had settled, Kakashi found himself still in the office – the ANBU had cleared out as soon as they could, all of them shuffling and avoiding Shizune´s eyes, some whispering excuses like "We had to obey her orders, she´s the Hokage…" at her in passing, though one of them had brushed past Kakashi, hissing: "Thanks a lot, Sempai!"

It went downhill from there.

"So, you´re actually complaining, aren't you?"

Tsunade – now properly seated behind her desk –glared at Kakashi disapprovingly. Kakashi swallowed, he had tried to make his point as subtly as possible and had started by merely asking about the coinciding of his and Gai´s free days. Of course, he knew better than to openly question the fifth Hokage and wouldn't ever dream of doing so without reason.

On the other hand, a Hokage usually never interfered with their jounins' training routines, or the clan policies. The only exception from that rule had been Sandaime´s putting a stop to Orochimaru´s experiments decades ago, and Kakashi hardly considered his case to be in any way comparable to that particular precedent.

He had expected his superior to trust his judgment as much as he trusted hers. Now he couldn't help but feel somewhat betrayed by her apparent lack of faith in him.

"Hokage-sama, I'm sorry, but you had Gai keep an eye on me behind my back," Kakashi ventured. "I just want to know why you thought that was necessary."

Tsunade sighed and started to rub her temples. "Isn't it obvious? You are the last person in this village with the Sharingan. Remember why that is? I may not have been here when it happened, but I do know about the Uchiha clan. Itachi accomplished what you are trying to do right now and the first thing he did with his newfound ability was to massacre his whole clan. Let´s just say that as the Fifth Hokage, it´s part of my job to prevent things like that."

"You don't really think that I would—"

Tsunade raised a forestalling hand. "I don´t. Then again no one thought Itachi would do what he did either at the time, and I can't afford to wait and see, not when lives might depend on it." The Hokage narrowed her eyes at him and added in a sharper tone: "And I´m talking about your life too, so stop complaining about it!"

Kakashi could almost feel the Damocles Sword of her impending fury graze his scalp; however, he still had one question to ask. "Why Gai?"

Tsunade´s anger was immediately replaced by sheer incredulity. "Whoever started calling you a genius? Who else would I ask? Gai is the closest thing you have to a friend. None of the other Jounin would have been able to spend as much time with you without immediately raising your suspicions; and just in case you were wondering about that, this wasn´t supposed to be a way for me to spy on you. If I had wanted to keep you under surveillance, I would have given it to an ANBU member as an official mission. I actually wanted Gai to be more of a support for you than an informant for me."

The Hokage sighed and continued: "Well, I didn´t expect you to never notice, as a matter of fact I would have been worried if you hadn´t, but I thought you and Gai would be grown up enough to deal with this among each other. I thought that he could talk to you as your friend and tell you to be careful and take it slow and perhaps not obsess more than absolutely necessary and – huh, I don´t know maybe even ask for help if you need it, though now I can see how that might have been too much to ask of two adult, supposedly elite Jounin."

Listening with his eye downcast, Kakashi braced himself for her lecture to go on. Her words were dripping with sarcasm already and he was more than a little sorry that he had ever set foot into her office. However, just as Tsunade had caught her breath – ready unload on him some more, no doubt – two dull thuds, clearly not a result of somebody knocking with anything lighter than his whole body, resounded from the double doors.

For a tense moment he could see the flicker of indecision on her face as she glanced from him to the doors and back, then suddenly something like a strained groan could be heard from outside the office and Tsunade took pity on whoever had the misfortune to visit her when she was in this kind of mood.

"Come in," the Hokage said dejectedly, while Kakashi wondered whether he was supposed to consider himself dismissed. He would have asked to be excused, but another groan, followed by the unmistakable slapping sound of files hitting the ground, and some rather colorful swearing distracted him.

Kakashi watched with carefully masked amusement as Kotetsu virtually fought his way into the office. The room´s heavy double doors were proving to be quite the obstacle for someone carrying a huge stack of files, which was starting to tilt dangerously to the left, understandably more inclined to give in to gravity´s ever present call, than the Chunin´s ridiculous attempts at keeping it balanced.

Funnily, it only occurred to the Copy-Ninja that he could have helped his colleague by holding one door open for him, _after_ Kotetsu had managed to make it past the doors all by himself. Kotetsu, although he was only able to get the slightest idea of where he was going by craning his neck to the side, dutifully proceeded through the room anyway. It was probably a small miracle that he reached the Hokage´s desk without tripping over the evidence of her previous "meeting".

He set the whole pile down on the edge of the desk and placed himself in front of it, next to Kakashi, whom he shot a somewhat puzzled glance, perhaps starting to suspect that he might have interrupted something. "So, what´s all this," Tsunade finally asked, after she had watched Kotetsu´s dangerous approach with the same quiet fascination as Kakashi. In response the Chunin stared at her, as if she had just asked him what that really bright, round thing in the sky, which only appeared during the day, could possibly be.

"Um, those are the application files for the Chunin-exams, Hokage-sama," Kotestu answered, making sure to speak slowly and articulating every word in a clear 'I am talking to someone mentally challenged/foreign'- manner, which, Kakashi suspected, might just get him killed. "You know, the ones you wanted to check personally?"

"Wait a moment, when did I say that? They should have been inspected by ANBU. In fact, I ordered Ibiki to take care of those two days ago." Tsunade´s mood was not getting better. Kakashi caught himself glancing longingly at the window, now closed and too far away for his liking. Kotetsu was obviously at a loss. "Shizune-san said just now that you wanted to look them over yourself, they´ve been at the ANBU headquarters and were examined, as far as I know, but she told me that after last time, well, you wanted to be extra- cautious and double-check them again."

"Shizune, hm?" There was suddenly a deep, ominous crease forming between Tsunade´s narrowed eyes.

Kakashi could see that this was headed into dangerous territory, his instincts were telling him to get away, but before he had a chance to act on them, the doors were pushed open energetically and Shizune all but skipped into the office, smiling sweetly and looking like the poster child for innocence and kindness.

"Ah, I see you got the first batch of the exam files already, Tsunade-sama! Great!"

"Shizune," the Hokage growled. "I distinctly remember giving orders about these files here; they were supposed to be dealt with by ANBU. They were _not_ supposed to end up on my desk. "

"I´m not needed here anymore, right?" Kotetsu seemed to have suddenly become painfully aware of his unfortunate position right between the Hokage and her assistant. "Yeah, I´ll just… Izumo is probably looking for me by now… so…" He started to move toward the doors and Kakashi considered this a good chance to take his leave as well. Kotetsu got exactly as far as one step and a half, while Kakashi had just concentrated his chakra enough to jutsu himself somewhere less potentially deadly, when Tsunade fixated them with a glare of sheer annoyance. "You," her eyes were on Kotetsu and she threw the pronoun at him like a kunai. Kotetsu immediately froze, his left foot suspended inches from the sticky floor. "You can go." He was out the door by the end of her sentence.

"_You_." Kakashi could literally feel his hopes evaporating in the heat of her stare. "You stay right where you are." He twitched. " And you, " Tsunade turned her head towards the still happily smiling Shizune, who was either completely unaware of the promise of a violent death crouching in the office like a starving tiger, or simply not very impressed by it.

"Explain to me why I don´t recall giving you authority over this decision, when I clearly must have done so, because otherwise you must have gone behind my back in a spectacularly stupid display of insubordination and that really wouldn´t be like you at all." The Fifth folded her arms and leaned back in her office chair in an 'I´m waiting and this better be good'-position.

Shizune didn´t show any sign of worry yet, but she did seem slightly hurt. "Of course, I would never go behind your back. I merely spoke to Ibiki-san about the last Chunin-exams and he told me that Orochimaru´s spy Kabuto had somehow gotten hold of the files last year. Apparently this must have happened while they were being examined and therefore inside the ANBU headquarters, so we think that there might have been a leak within the ANBU, and that there might in fact still be reason to be concerned about that. So, to make sure that nothing like that can happen this time, Ibiki-san and I thought that you would probably want to double-check the files yourself and have them stored here for security."

Tsunade´s frown had gradually deepened throughout Shizune´s little speech, however, she didn´t seem to be able to find any real fault – anything to justify her utter annoyance – in this explanation, a fact which only served to piss her off even more. "But you _did_ order the files to be brought here without asking me first and you told Kotetsu that it was my decision when I hadn´t even been informed, right?"

"Well, yes. I thought it would be best not to waste time with that because I know how important security is right now, with the Chunin exams coming up, and I was sure that you would share Ibiki-san´s and my concerns and would want to deal with this immediately." Shizune beamed. "After all, you placed that security meeting with the ANBU squat leaders right on top of your priority list and insisted to have it today, despite your many other obligations."

Tsunade bit back a groan. It was becoming obvious that she couldn´t think of a way to gracefully pawn the work off on someone else or find any other tactic to avoid it. Her expression was the picture of defeat. Kakashi felt for her, he knew that special kind of misery, which only an impending mountain of paperwork could induce. He had seen it countless times in the eyes of some poor Chunin behind a desk, whenever he presented one of his mission reports.

Seemingly oblivious to her boss´s anguish, Shizune turned and called cheerfully over her shoulder: "I´ll go and tell Ibiki-san to have the rest of the files transferred then," before hurrying through the doors with a smile on her face and a spring in her step.

"There´s more?" This time the Hokage didn´t hold back the groan as she eyed the impressive pile on her desk wearily. Her hands travelled up to her temples again and she started massaging them. "I´m getting a headache already… I really need a drink." At this point Kakashi would have loved to leave her alone with her imminent alcoholism, but since she hadn't dismissed him earlier he guessed that there was still something she wanted to tell him.

"Hokage-sama," he said tentatively to remind her of his presence, yet hoping at the same time not to remind her of his role in her previously ruined meeting and its consequences. She glowered at him, then sighed when he held her gaze. "I´m fairly certain Gai didn´t say what I´m about to say now, since he just doesn´t have it in him to think like that, but… well, I want you to consider the possibility that you may simply not be able to master the Mangekyo. Ever. I think you understand what I´m trying to say."

"Yes, I understand, Tsunade-sama." Kakashi lowered his gaze. Of course, it had occurred to him before. He wasn´t an Uchiha after all, and yet hearing the Hokage point his limits out to him made his efforts seem all the more futile.

"Good." Tsunade leaned back in her office chair again, however, instead of allowing him to leave as he had expected, she waited for him to look her in the eyes, then added sternly: "There´s another thing; Sakura is – as you should have been able to guess – going to take the Chunin exam again. Talk to her, wish her luck, it´s the least you should do."

"I will." In fact, Kakashi had not thought – deliberately not thought – about Sakura for quite some time now. So she was taking the exam. He found himself –much to his own surprise– wondering how she would do, whether she would pass this time. If she did, he knew that _he_ didn´t deserve any credit for it.

"You can go." The Fifth was already turning towards her stack of files when she uttered the dismissal.

He didn´t need to be told twice.

* * *

><p>Kakashi stopped reminiscing about his unfortunate encounter with the Hokage and started concentrating on his current problem: finding Gai and talking to him without it seeming like he was making the first move, because he was tired of waiting for Gai to give in. The only way would probably be to 'accidentally' run into him somewhere.<p>

Maybe then he could finally find out what the hell was wrong between them.


	2. Chapter 2

Kakashi weaved through the unusually busy streets of Konoha. Everywhere he looked foreign forehead protectors were gleaming in the sun, reminding him that the first round of the Chunin exam was merely a week away. More and more Genin teams accompanied by their Jounin teachers were arriving every day now.

As he made his way through the crowd, Kakashi could feel countless eyes on himself. He didn´t need to look up from his open book to know that every Genin he walked past was scanning the throng of people for potential competition. Their gazes slid over him, registered his vest, and moved on in search of other Genin. However, once in a while he felt the needle prick sensation of an unfamiliar Jounin´s attention focusing on him for less than the blink of an eye. Then Kakashi brought his nose even closer to the pages of Icha Icha and examined the person in question out of the corner of his eye. Sadly, for a ninja terms like "peace" and "allies" were always relative and it wouldn´t hurt to get a preview of possible future enemies.

Originally, he´d had high hopes that he'd be able to save himself a lot of time and energy by bumping into Gai somewhere in the streets of the village, but as he drew closer to the Jounin Lounge, the first and with any luck last place he was going to search for the other man, Kakashi was starting to suspect that this might not go as smoothly as he had planned. After all, there had been no sign of Gai on his way to the inconspicuous building near the Hokage tower which housed the meeting point for Jounin on standby.

As he approached, Kakashi saw a familiar, tall man leaning with his back against the wall right next to the entrance. Asuma seemed to be lost in thought, watching blue-grey swirls of smoke twisting around each other lazily in the air in front of him through half-closed eyes; the source of the thinning strands of smoke hanging limply from his lips. To almost everyone walking past the jounin probably appeared to be on the verge of falling asleep on his feet and quite oblivious to his surroundings. Kakashi, however, knew that his colleague had already noticed him, had identified him as a fellow Konoha Ninja and was merely too busy relaxing to greet him and start a conversation.

Kakashi contemplated just uttering a greeting and leaving Asuma to his cigarette break, but he was too tempted by the notion that disturbing the other man might save _him_ some trouble. Asuma would know whether Gai was inside and not only that, he might even know what mood Gai was in. When it came down to the question whether to inconvenience somebody else to make his own life easier… Well, that wasn´t even a question, now was it? Kakashi couldn´t suppress an upwards twitch of the corner of his mouth; things were starting to look up again.

Pocketing his book and walking the last steps towards his victim with a feeling akin to elation, he didn´t need to fake the joyful tones of his greeting.

"Asuma! Hey. It´s been a while. How are you?" Then, thinking that if he was going to annoy the poor guy anyway, he might as well go all out, he added with a saccharine smile concealed by his mask, "How´s Kurenai?"

Asuma had reluctantly turned towards the other Jounin at his first words and responded with a less enthusiastic version of Kakashi´s "Hey." At the mention of Kurenai, however, a blush crept up his neck, he avoided Kakashi´s friendly gaze and muttered, "How would I know?"

It was a miracle Asuma had survived as long as he had with his evident lack of subtlety and stealth, Kakashi thought. He hadn´t even managed to keep the slight tremor out of his voice at that last question.

Seconds later Asuma had caught himself and focused back on his colleague.

"Is this about Sakura?"

Now it was Kakashi´s turn to be momentary flustered. He couldn't possibly imagine what Asuma was trying to say, or why he would bring her up and yet he suddenly remembered his promise to talk to his former student, which he had not actually kept at that point in time, he just hadn´t found the right moment to do it yet. But he would, of course he would. He could feel a tidal wave of guilt rising within him, which he immediately fought down.

"Sakura? What about her?" Now _his_ voice, Kakashi noted proudly, didn´t betray anything but innocent curiosity.

"I just thought you might want to know how she´s doing." Asuma was looking at him funnily now, like there was something completely obvious he was expecting from him, which should be coming any second. Kakashi, however, had no idea what it was. Why would he have to ask Asuma of all people about Sakura? It was true that the two of them hadn´t seen each other for some time, since Kakashi had spent the last months either away on missions, or training alone and he clearly was behind on what was going on in the village.

Well, Asuma´s phrase was echoing his earlier question about Kurenai, so… Asuma was trying to tell him that he should have asked about Sakura instead? Because he wasn´t dating Kurenai anymore, but Sakura? No, that couldn´t be it! Sakura was 14 years old! Could it? Kakashi´s face was starting to grow incredibly hot; his headband and mask soaked up most of the sweat thankfully, but he really needed to tear himself away from this line of thought. Rationally, there was only one reason for him to enquire after Sakura right now.

"Does this have something to do with the Chunin exams? Why would I ask _you_ about that?"

Asuma almost dropped his cigarette at that. "You mean you don´t know?" Without waiting for the at that point fairly redundant answer he went on, "Sakura is taking the exam as a member of my team – I mean, not that I´m her sensei now, but she´ll be put in a squad with Chouji and Ino, which is why I´m training the three of them."

"Ah." Kakashi realized that Asuma expected more from him than just this monosyllabic acknowledgement of the facts, at least now he had an idea what he was supposed to ask. "Well, I guess that´s only natural. So, how are they doing?" Still, there was that feeling of guilt again. Deep down Kakashi knew that he should show more interest in Sakura, but his predominating emotion at that moment was an appalling amount of sheer gratitude that Tsunade had not ordered him to assist Sakura in her training.

Shoving his tangled web of feelings aside, Kakashi focused on Asuma, who seemed to be in his element discussing his students. "They´re in pretty good shape; took them a while to adjust, of course. Sakura´s skills are quite impressive, but she´s a completely different type from Shikamaru." He shrugged. "I wouldn´t worry though, they´ve grown a lot."

It hadn´t even occurred to Kakashi to worry, at least now he wouldn´t have to feel ashamed about that. Their conversation had taken him into not exactly comfortable territory, however, he now sensed an opportunity to steer it back in the direction he had wanted it to take in the first place. Nevertheless, with the topic of the Chunin exams on hand, Kakashi had a convenient cover for bringing up Gai as a seemingly natural progression of their chat.

"You´re not bothered by the competition then," he wondered, keeping his voice light and playful.

"Hm," Asuma took the cigarette out of his mouth and flicked the ashes absentmindedly into the direction of the ground, while looking past Kakashi at the busy street. "There _are _a lot of Genin this time and there´s still a week left until the preliminaries begin. Ah well, that´ll only make it more interesting." He chuckled and slipped the cigarette back between his lips.

Apparently, the older Jounin needed another nudge into the right direction. "What about Kurenai´s and Gai´s teams?"

Just hearing Kurenai´s name was enough to bring bright spots of pink into full bloom on Asuma´s cheeks. Even behind his almost ever present veil of smoke, Kakashi could easily make them out. It was kind of endearing, he thought, his colleague clearly had it bad.

Asuma, quite embarrassed now, even had to clear his throat before speaking. "Kurenai is… I mean her team…they´re doing great. Yeah. Great." He smiled and scratched the back of his head sheepishly. "And Gai?" Kakashi prodded, "Any idea what he´s been up to recently?" At this point, he figured, he didn´t need to be especially subtle anymore, since the other man seemed to be rather lost in whatever thoughts he entertained about their female colleague.

"Eh?" Asuma jerked out of his happy Kurenai-fantasy and gave the question some consideration. "He´s been clocking in a lot of mission time with his team, as far as I know. Yeah, he told me some time ago that he wanted them to get as much experience as possible first and then use the time directly before the exam for individual training." He frowned as if remembering something unpleasant which had been repressed upon occurring. "Of course, Gai didn´t use these words. He called it a 'splendid' strategy, had a name for it and everything … burning …hot…something?" Asuma shook his head. "Can´t remember. Geez, how the hell does he come up with this stuff, anyway? And _why_?"

But Kakashi was only half listening at that point, because if Gai had indeed been as busy with missions as the other Jounin claimed – and he had no reason to doubt Asuma´s words – then there was the distinct possibility that Gai hadn´t snubbed him on purpose at all, but had just been too caught up in his preparation for the Chunin exams too issue his usual challenges. Also, Kakashi hadn´t exactly been idle himself. With their full mission schedules, maybe they had only accidentally missed each other and if that was the case, Gai had probably forgotten about their last challenge already and they could just go back to normal.

Now to verify the location of his target.

"He´s at the training grounds, I take it?"

"I´m pretty sure he is." Asuma tilted his head back and blinked into the bright, sunny sky. "I´ve got to go there, too. I told Shikamaru to develop combat strategies with Ino, Sakura and Chouji." He sighed; "It´s good training for him, though by now he´s probably cursing my name…"

Kakashi, who had already been on the verge of leaving, paused at that, feeling that he should show some interest in this after all. "Training not going as well as it should?" The least he could do would be to offer advice if needed.

"Nah, they make a pretty good team, I mean, sure they have the disadvantage of not being able to take the exam with their original teams, but… well, that can´t be helped.. .and they have known each other since they went to the academy together…" Another sigh. "Actually, that might be a part of the problem. They could be a great team if only there wasn´t so much… _bickering_."

Kakashi had to fight a smile at the utter misery in Asuma´s voice. "Sakura and Ino, hm?" He remembered their vicious match and the underlying tenderness they held for each other, which they had been trying so desperately to shatter with their fists. "Ah, the mystery of rivalries..."

"Yeah, I guess you know all about that."Asuma plucked the cigarette from his lips, dropped it carelessly, and ground it out with a quick twist of his foot. "Well, I´m going."

Kakashi hung back and considered his options. There was no way he could convincingly 'just happen to meet' Gai on the training grounds, then again he might not need to pretend anymore. It had been weeks since their fight – if one could even call it that – and Gai had apparently been extremely occupied with his team. In all likelihood, Gai had forgotten anything had ever happened, which meant that he could just stroll over to him without it seeming like he was giving in.

Since Kakashi was already tired of waiting, he decided to take his chances with the more or less direct approach. After all, what was the worst that could possibly happen?

* * *

><p>Kakashi stood, frozen, clinging desperately to the tree he had been aiming to lean against with his usual air of cool charm, while Gai waved his index finger dramatically in his face and shouted for everyone on the surrounding training grounds– and possibly the planet– to hear, "AHA! My remorseful rival has returned to acknowledge his mistakes and make his apologies like a true man!" He whipped around energetically to address his three bewildered – on second thought make that two bewildered and one enraptured – students and proclaimed, "Like I told you, the passion of an intense rivalry can lead to fierce disagreements, BUT – " with a speed that would have given a lesser man whiplash he turned back to Kakashi, "after the initial heat of the argument has cooled off, the misguided party will surely see reason and seek forgiveness, isn´t that right, my rival?"<p>

Kakashi stared, then glanced past Gai at the three teenagers, then stared at 'his rival' some more. "You told them?" To say his voice was incredulous would be like saying the sun was lukewarm. "Naturally, what better way is there to teach them about the difficulties they will have to face during the course of their youth?" Gai´s chest was swelling with pride in his own efficiency as a teacher.

"Ugh, there were tears," Tenten supplied, from the sound of it she didn´t exactly cherish the memory. "Hugs, too," Neji added, sounding completely resigned to his fate.

"Thanks for reminding me, I was repressing that."

"You´re welcome."

"It was a beautiful moment of bonding!" Lee chimed in happily.

Not for the first time, Kakashi felt his annoyance with Gai reach epic proportions; however, he stayed completely calm when he asked him whether they could talk this over somewhere else. 

_Alone_.


	3. Chapter 3

Finally, the two of them had left Gai´s students to their training and were walking around the lake – Kakashi fuming silently, Gai still cheerfully oblivious. Or at least Kakashi had thought he was until Gai gave him a lingering sidelong glance and said evenly, "If you aren´t going to apologize, then why did you come?"

It was a valid question, Kakashi had to admit. It was also one he didn´t really know how to answer. Why had he felt the need to get back into Gai´s good graces? Why had he been so quick to believe that everything was well between them and had made his move first, when he was usually much more cautious and distant?

Looking back on the last weeks, Kakashi could probably blame the stress of his duties. Missions had been coming in in abundance and, as a Jounin with no lower class subordinates to consider, he had been issued his fair share of high risk solo missions. But it was more than that.

It was his training.

He couldn´t even remember anymore how many hours he had spent trying to figure out a way to make his Sharingan change, to make it _evolve._ Focusing, collecting his chakra in his (_Obito´s_) left eye until he thought the eyeball would simply burst out of his skull any moment; the pain, a pounding sensation emanating from his pupil and echoing all through his head in ripples of sheer agony, forcing him to stop. He had tried everything he had ever learned about chakra manipulation, but the outcome never changed.

He had thought about giving up – especially now that, after his conversation with Tsunade, he could tell himself that his doubts were justified, that it might be the smarter choice to accept what seemed to be his natural limitations, and to improve his other skills instead – but then he would close his eyes in resignation and through the red fireworks of pain erupting in the darkness behind his eye he would see –

_Obito still half-smiling, even as Rin´s scalpel slides under his eyelid _–

And he knew that he would never be able to forgive himself if he gave up.

So he kept going.

Meanwhile, Gai had planted himself in front of him, abandoning the pretense of a casual stroll around the lake. Kakashi stopped, avoided his friend´s expectant stare, and shrugged without taking his hands out of his pockets. "You´re the one who walked away in the middle of our last conversation," he drawled.

Gai frowned, Kakashi could tell that much without actually looking at his face. The sudden tension in his folded arms gave him away. It was the kind of stance Gai used when overseeing his students training and his expression, Kakashi guessed, was the one reserved for the poor brat who collapsed during the 499th round around the village. The look that said, _I thought you could do better than that_.

Over the years it had had an almost miraculous effect on Gai´s Genin, Kakashi had to give him that, always inspiring the right mixture of shame, defiance, and deep down inside, but maybe strongest –especially in orphans – the craving for their teacher´s approval.

Needless to say, it had absolutely no impact on Kakashi.

"You know that I was only acting on orders from the Hokage," Gai offered when it became clear that Kakashi wouldn´t give him a direct answer to his question.

"She ordered you to criticize my training and then to run off when I do the same to you?" Kakashi scratched his nose in mock-confusion. "She must be getting old, that´s the strangest mission I´ve ever heard of."

Trust Gai to be the only person to fall for a provocation this blatantly obvious.

"Gah! I… you! That´s not the point! And it wasn´t an official mission. And…" Gai seemed to remember that he wasn´t supposed to be on the defense. He collected his wits and pulled his right arm out from under the crook of his left elbow in an exaggerated flurry of motion to point his finger at Kakashi´s nose, as if to remind himself where the blame had to be shoved; a sudden breeze underlining his movement by tossing a few leaves in the same direction.

"And _you_, my rival, are the one acting recklessly!"

Kakashi had to fight an eye roll because he really didn´t want to strain himself like that and provoke a headache, he already had enough of them as it was.

Gai was standing there, a few feet away from him in his private bubble of self-righteousness, _sparkling _in the sunlight like the surface of the lake. The picture of pure innocence, as if he had never done anything less than ideal.

Perhaps, Kakashi thought, if I just bring up Lee´s match at the last Chuunin exams, Gai will get off my back and leave me alone.

However, that would probably only throw them back to where they had been ten weeks ago. There had to be another approach to this.

"I talked to her, you know," Kakashi said conversationally. "She told me to quit my training. That I probably didn´t have the ability anyway." He smiled.

"WHAT?" Gai flinched so hard it made him stumble backwards, which in turn caused him to wave his arms around in a fight for balance. "But… but… She never said anything like that to me!" He sounded like he felt betrayed.

"She might be right," Kakashi continued, pretending not to notice Gai´s agitation. "I´m no Uchiha." And a slight hint of defeat crept into his words despite his best intentions.

Gai surprised him then.

He walked up to Kakashi until they were toe to toe; the younger Jounin watching each of the other´s steps, and still looking down at their feet in puzzlement when they were almost touching, until Gai slapped both of his hands down on Kakashi´s shoulders, making his chin jerk up.

"Are you going to give up?," he asked, his voice hard and steady. Kakashi stared into Gai´s eyes , closer and more intense than he could remember them ever being. Those big hands gripping his shoulders, the same hands that had pulled him out of the water at _that_ time, were familiar and warm. This close, he could smell Gai´s minty breath and the sharp hint of his sweat. _This_ _close,_ he could almost feel the heat from the other man´s body.

A part of him wanted to wrench itself out of Gai´s grip, but in the chaos of his conflicting emotions it wasn´t influential enough to get his muscles to obey.

He didn´t know what he _really_ wanted. Gai was too close to him, intruding into his personal space like that, like he wasn´t even aware that they weren´t supposed to be that close; that each of them had to have their own separate space. It made Kakashi angry and that was why his heart was beating so hard that he could barely hear anything over the white noise of the rush of blood in his ears.

Also, Gai had asked him a question he didn´t know how to answer again.

Kakashi didn´t _want_ to give up, but he had been trying for a long time with absolutely no sign of progress. The rationalist in him told him that there might not even _be _a question anymore. However, he knew that he couldn´t say that to Gai, because it would only result in an 'encouraging' speech and the last thing he needed was Gai crying into his vest and telling him between sobs that everything would be alright if he just believed in himself. He wasn´t Rock Lee, for heaven´s sake.

He tore his gaze away from Gai´s too intense, dark eyes and asked coolly, "What difference does it make to you?" It startled Gai, this answer, again Kakashi could tell that much without meeting the other´s eyes. Gai´s fingers tightened on his shoulders, as if to keep him from slipping out of their grasp.

"You are my eternal rival and I believe in you. I won´t just let you give up."

Kakashi couldn´t help but sigh at that, it was as he had predicted; Gai thought that he needed his support and that a few words from him would have the power to change the facts, if he just put enough conviction into them. However, the moment he turned back to face Gai, he realized that one part of his prediction had not come true. There were no tears in the other man´s eyes, they were filled with nothing but steely determination. It was the expression he wore on the battlefield.

"I´m not giving up," Kakashi said. Though, as soon as he saw relief soften the lines of Gai´s face he added nonchalantly, "but none of that has anything to do with you." As he said it, Kakashi took his hands out of his pockets, wrapped his fingers around Gai´s wrists – _not_ noticing the warmth of the other man's skin or the beat of his pulse against his sensitive fingertips – and pushed the older Jounin´s hands off his shoulders resolutely.

Gai let his hands drop to his sides, clenching them into fists hard enough to make his knuckles stand out white against his tanned skin. However, he was not one to back down at the first hint of resistance. And to Gai even a rejection this blatant fell into that category.

"Yes it does! We have been rivals for many years now and we have always pushed each other past our limits! Our challenges made us stronger; they _are _still making us stronger!" Gai had steadily raised his voice throughout his speech, but now he lowered it, brought his fists – from the look of his bulging triceps, they were clenched even harder than before – up to his chest, and caught Kakashi´s eye. "I can help you, Kakashi," he said, every word resounding with utter certainty.

The Copy Ninja snorted. Unlike most people in the village, he had never once openly mocked Gai – of course, the ones who laughed at Gai were only those who had never seen him fight, Kakashi couldn´t think of a single person who had looked at the 'Green Beast' in quite the same way after they had seen him on the battlefield – but he sure was tempted now.

Gai seemed to have lost touch with reality. Yes, they had been sparring for years, but in their case "sparring" could literally mean anything. They had had eating contests, footraces – even handstand races for that matter –, push up contests, drinking contests, that horrible who-can-do –the-most-back flips-without-getting-sick-competition, which Kakashi had lost rather spectacularly, and which was Never To Be Mentioned Again , and, of course, countless rounds of the ever popular game of rock, paper, scissors.

All in all, Kakashi was just a little skeptical about the helpfulness of those challenges when it came to actually improving his skills. Unless a handstand race was the secret key to master the Mangekyo, he couldn´t picture Gai being of any use to him in this respect.

Saying that outright, however, would probably only lead to an endless argument because Gai never backed down when it came to defending the importance of his sometimes absolutely ludicrous challenges.

And yet, there were words forming in his mind, trickling down onto the back of his tongue and pushing him to finally say them.

"We've never had a real challenge."

The words were left there, hanging in the air between them on this otherwise normal and quite beautiful afternoon. It was only Gai`s utter incomprehension that stood in the way of a full-blown outburst on his part, Kakashi suspected.

As it was, Gai just stared at him in bewilderment. "What do you mean? All of our challenges are real, they are the cornerstones of our rivalry!" Gai frowned, clearly trying his hardest to think up a way to steer this conversation back into a more familiar direction. "Well," he finally said in a more confident tone, "it's your turn to issue a new challenge anyway! Might as well make it a 'real' one this time, eh?"

Kakashi sighed, wondering silently how often Gai had elicited this reaction from him – probably more often than anyone else. "What I meant, Gai, was that all those – " He needed a second to come up with an insulting enough term for their usual activities. "_Games_ we normally indulge in –" and he could already see that he was hitting a nerve. Gai's expression had changed ever so slightly. It was all in his eyes, Kakashi knew, and now there was steel in Gai's gaze. "Were completely pointless wastes of time." He said it with a twinkle in his eye and a dismissive shrug. "They say nothing about our respective skill and you know that too. Right, Gai?"

"Kakashi—" For once, Gai was holding back his emotions, but Kakashi could hear the anger; he could remember a hundred different ways Gai said his name, and he could count the times Gai had spoken his name like that on the fingers of one hand.

Unwilling to listen to whatever it was Gai wanted to tell him in that tone, Kakashi cut him off without raising his voice. "I want to fight you seriously." The words were enough, it didn't really matter how he presented them. He didn't believe in artificial sunsets, tears, and melodrama. It was said that kindness could kill, but Kakashi found that casualness worked much better for him.

Gai was apparently too stunned to react at all. He just stood and stared; not quite able to process what he had heard. "Seriously?" He asked eventually, sounding slightly faint, "you mean…?" He didn't finish the question. Not, Kakashi thought, because he was simply at a loss about what Kakashi meant, but because he didn't want to say it, lest he turned out to be right.

"No time limit, no restrictions – weapons, jutsus, everything goes – and the fight lasts until one of us is incapable of going on." Kakashi stated matter- of- fact-ly.

"But that's— _you know_ that's impossible and _insane_!" Outrage and accusation were battling for dominance in Gai's voice. His eyes had gone wide and any second now he'd probably start grinding his teeth in frustration. Kakashi almost felt sorry for him, but he wasn't going to make this any easier for him – well, both of them really – any time soon.

"That's the challenge. Take it or leave it," spoken just like any other sentence.

Kakashi was prepared for furious yelling, even for Gai storming off in anger; however, he wasn't quite ready for Gai's searching gaze and the gentleness in his tone when he asked, "why?"

Somehow, it led him to lower his defenses for a moment and he found himself answering without thinking.

"You said you wanted to help, didn't you?" As replies went, this one was far more revealing than Kakashi had wanted it to be, but once said he couldn't take it back.

And of course, Gai had to choose this moment to be perceptive. "So it's about that…"

Kakashi cringed inwardly. "It's…" He faltered; there really was no way he could explain this to the other jounin. "Not something you need to understand. Let's leave it at that."

"It's dangerous. Extremely reckless," Gai said gravely. He cupped his chin and frowned in an unnecessarily obvious 'I'm thinking very hard'-manner. "There's no way we could do it here."

If Kakashi had had Gai's habit to express his every emotion physically, he would have had to keel over from the sheer force of Gai's sudden mood change. Going from condemning the challenge to wondering about the practicalities of going through with it in the space of less than a minute…

"You don't have any missions this week, right?" All sensei were off duty for the exam, and – inexplicably − so was Kakashi even though he didn't consider himself a teacher anymore. For some reason he couldn't quite fathom, Tsunade's definition of 'sensei' still included him.

Gai's immediate protest on the other hand was entirely expected. "That's because I'm supposed to train my students for the exam! They are definitely going to cross over into the much harder world of chuunin this time! These are their last days as innocent genin; I can't possibly leave them now!"

"Gai, I'm pretty sure they can spare you for a day or two. Just write them a training plan or something." He couldn't keep the amusement out of his voice; Gai could turn the most serious discussion around just by being himself. And that apparently also meant being an incredible mother hen.

Gai folded his arms over his chest in an effort to show that there really was no way he was going to give in. "No, this is an important time in their lives. As their teacher I have to put them first!"

Kakashi wasn't fooled for a second. He had mastered an attitude that combined his usual aloofness with an underlying dare; it never failed to irritate Gai into compliance. "Come on, Gai, it will probably do them good. You know, it'll prepare them for the cold realities of adult life, where people always abandon you when you need them the most. It will make them grow."

"Arrrgh…" Clearly caught off guard by the utter shamelessness of that argument, Gai was fighting with himself, but as usual he was unable to counter Kakashi's twisted logic. "Fine," he sighed.

"Good," Kakashi said. He was starting to feel tense. Were they really going to do this?

"There's a place – a clearing in the forest – about half a day southwest of Konoha. You know it, right?"

Gai nodded.

"It should be far enough from the village to not attract any attention." Hopefully, because the last thing he wanted was to have to explain this to the Hokage, especially after she had told him to let it go. "Meet me there the day after tomorrow. Let's say at noon."

Now, Kakashi thought, all he could do was wait and see. Gai still had the chance to back out of this more or less gracefully. He knew it, too, and was probably considering it right this second. Kakashi couldn't read him, however, his face was uncharacteristically blank; his eyes like endless space. Not dead or empty, but too vast and deep to read or understand. And when did he start rambling on and on about Gai's eyes? He was beginning to sound like Jiraiya's early short stories.

Tentatively, Gai broke the silence. "Kakashi… are you really sure about this?" It sounded suspiciously like the opening line for a long talk about things Kakashi didn't want to talk about.

"Just be there," he said curtly and turned to leave.

He half-expected Gai to stop him and was almost disappointed when he didn't.


	4. Chapter 4

At home, Kakashi immediately started to pack like he would for a normal S-rank mission. It kept him from thinking about what he was doing and more importantly about what he was _going_ to do.

The idea had blossomed in a corner of his mind like an ominous flower before he had really noticed, anyway. Unaware of it, he had opened his mouth and it had poured out of him. It was dangerous and wrong, but inexplicably it was right, too.

He needed to do it. _That _he knew.

In front of him, Kakashi had spread out an assortment of weapons. Kunai and shuriken, all of them clean and recently sharpened, gleaming and deadly.

Kakashi picked out what he needed − a fairly standard collection of kunai and shuriken − and put it into his backpack.

He would leave the next morning, taking his time to get to the meeting point and spending the night in the woods to be rested. He hoped Gai would do the same.

He hoped Gai wouldn't ask any more questions.

* * *

><p>Kakashi had – much to his own surprise – slept well both nights. He felt that he shouldn't have under the circumstances; he should have been restless and doubting himself. He should have been worrying, wondering if he had lost his mind, and if Gai in this endless pursuit he called a rivalry had thrown his away, too.<p>

And yet, for whatever reason, he woke up rested and calm, blinking into the rays of sunlight filtering through the leaves above him. Just to make sure that he wouldn't run into Gai, he had crossed the clearing the previous day and had kept moving further away from Konoha for an additional half hour. He had even gone so far to leave his tent in his backpack, not really setting up camp to avoid drawing attention. Thankfully, it had been mild enough to sleep without a tent or a fire, and now he had the additional benefit of not having to do much in terms of breaking up camp.

Kakashi turned the trip to the meeting point into a leisurely stroll; hiding from the deep brooding thoughts that hovered at the edge of his awareness behind his worn copy of Icha Icha.

When he arrived at the place – only two minutes late − Gai was there, right in the middle of the clearing with his hands on his hips and his head cocked, the sun hitting is teeth just so, producing an audible _ping. _His usual pose, like on any other day, any other challenge.

"Hey." Kakashi dropped his pack casually, pushing it out of the way into the thicket, and made a show of taking in his surroundings. The place was fairly isolated – about twelve hours on foot from the village, it was just out of range of the surveillance towers, and although it was one of the few more open places in the otherwise thick forest, it wasn't really frequented by anyone. Travelers usually stayed closer to the roads and Ninja would avoid a location with as little cover as clearing was only remarkable as a landmark because it occasionally served as a destination for the annual Academy camping trip.

Basically, it was just a meadow framed by trees and shrubs. A pretty little place, healthy green grass - just a little more than ankle high - sprinkled with flowers even, all of that under the vast blue sky. Peaceful.

Treacherous.

And Gai fit right into the picture. In his stupid green spandex suit that would actually have made great camouflage - being the same vivid shade of green as the grass and the leaves – if it weren't for his hideous orange legwarmers. Gai never really blended in.

Bright grin, confident stance and a cheeriness that was neither entirely genuine, nor entirely false, but always a slightly disturbing. From the way he was tracking every one of Kakashi's movements and from the fact that his smile didn't really reach his eyes, Kakashi could tell that Gai was waiting, calculating, maybe regretting that he had come already.

"Kakashi," Gai said, the uncharacteristically curt greeting confirming Kakashi's suspicion. Gai was tense, Kakashi could sympathize.

He wanted to do this before Gai had time to really think it over.

"You ready?" Kakashi asked, pulling up his headband. Gai's chakra circuit unfolded inside of him like a piece of paper being folded into a complex origami figure, making him look half-transparent.

_Fragile._

Gai seemed at a loss, reaching for words – or for _reason_.

"Do you want to default already?" Just a hint of mockery there. Maybe he _had _pushed Gai too far, maybe – for the first time ever he would give up – and then what?

Would he go back to his useless training sessions? Would he eventually give up? Perhaps all of this was pointless anyway, perhaps at some point his eye would evolve on its own in time. But time was of the essence, time was slithering away like a snake. Further and further away from him with every step Sasuke took towards his brother, led by Orochimaru's hand.

Well, if he had time to wait, he wouldn't be doing this.

"Hah, I would never give up!" The answer was automatic – it was heartfelt nonetheless. Kakashi cocked his head in response and said "I guess that makes two of us then."

And that won Gai over – he could tell. Because for all their differences, they were still two Konoha jounin. Believing in the same things and fighting for them. They had been doing this for more than a decade, through the war, as well as what passed for peace in the world they lived in.

In retrospect, they had been through a lot together.

He shifted his weight − feet shoulder width apart − and pulled a kunai out of his pocket. When the sunlight hit the blade, it out-gleamed even Gai's teeth. Slowly, Kakashi inhaled, tasting the fresh forest air, listening to the sounds of nature around them. In a second they would tear through the harmonious atmosphere, replacing birdsong with the scrape and clang of metal, the rustle of leaves in the wind with the dull sounds of fists hitting flesh and grunts of pain.

He could see Gai's Adam's apple bob as he swallowed. His eyes were already carefully averted from Kakashi's face, one hand came up tentatively, while he tucked the other behind his back. Gai was getting ready, too. Kakashi hadn't known that it was possible to be disappointed and relieved at the same time.

"So," Kakashi said. The word, small as it was, seemed to fit just barely into the space already bursting with unsaid things between them. There was no room for anything more. All he could do was wait for Gai – if there were second thoughts, this was his chance to say so. To stop this.

"On three?" Gai sounded normal, smiling boyishly, meeting Kakashi's eyes for the last time before the fight started. His face was open, his eyes warm with unbreakable trust. Kakashi wanted to call the whole thing off right then.

"Yeah." It took a lot of effort to say that one word.

"One," Gai said, eyes firmly below Kakashi's neck.

"Two." Kakashi's nails dug into the bandages wrapped around the hilt of his kunai.

"Three." Gai was gone, leaving only the blurry electric blue afterimage of his chakra behind. Even with his Sharingan activated it was hard to keep up with Gai's speed. He caught the flashes of chakra, but Gai was always one step ahead before he could focus.

Suddenly, Gai was in front of him, his foot slicing through the air. Kakashi jumped back too late. With a wet thudding sound, Gai's foot connected; a true whirlwind of a roundhouse kick. And then, the clone exploded in a cloud of innocent white smoke.

Kakashi had planned to use this short moment of confusion to attack from behind. Physically, he had a hard time keeping up with Gai, but intellectually Kakashi had the upper hand. In a normal fight he would probably have tried to end the thing with a Raikiri at this point.

This was Gai, however. And despite what he had said, there were still limits to how far he was willing to go. He hesitated. The whole purpose of this fight was to break through his boundaries and yet attacking Gai from behind with the Raikiri…

Even if he only graced him, he could wound Gai severely. On the hospital roof he had told Sasuke and Naruto that they should never use certain techniques against a comrade. So, would he ignore his own advice now?

Gai had not only amazing strength, speed and stamina, he also knew Kakashi's attack patterns and strategies better than anyone else. This early in the fight, he should be able to dodge anything Kakashi threw at him. But there were no guarantees in any fight, slip ups happened, people got hurt.

In a decade of challenges they had injured each other before, of course, mostly bruises, but there had been the occasional fractured bone or torn muscle. Nothing that had required more than an hour of healing and a day of rest tops. And now Kakashi had the unsettling premonition that they were about to break that record.

He had waited too long. Gai had spotted him − crouching behind a bush at the edge of the clearing − and was charging at him with the determination of a raging bull. Leaves were torn away violently as Gai's fist reduced Kakashi's flimsy cover to tiny shreds. Like all-natural confetti it rained down on him. Kakashi leapt back, startled. Gai had caught him off guard, but the punch hadn't connected. It had just been a warning, aimed more at the space in front of him than Kakashi himself.

For the moment Kakashi had no choice but to keep evading him, letting Gai chase him back and forth across the clearing, sometimes diving into the surrounding forest for more cover when he came too close for comfort. As far as strategies went, this one was horribly inappropriate for fighting someone like Gai.

Kakashi knew he could never outlast the other jounin. When it came to stamina, Gai was definitely in the lead. He was tireless. And Gai knew it, too. A much more impulsive fighter than Kakashi, he only slowed down to devise a plan if he had no other choice. His first instinct was always the all-out attack. Hunting his target down and pressing them with a non-stop taijutsu onslaught until he finally – almost inevitably – overpowered them.

Right now, Kakashi was wasting his energy. He needed to get past his reservations and do what he had set out to do. However, Gai was nowhere near fighting seriously either. Someone had to up the ante, and Kakashi had the feeling that it would have to be him.


	5. Chapter 5

Adrenaline was rushing through Kakashi's system, fueling the fire. It would be so easy to fall into the familiar rhythm now, to just fight like they always did. Kakashi had to pull himself together. Gai was zoning in on him. Timing was of the essence now.

He caught a glimpse of Gai pulling his right arm back for the first punch and threw himself down, bracing himself with his hands on the soft ground. Not exactly graceful, but necessary. Momentarily fazed, Gai needed a split second longer than usual to rearrange himself for low attacks.

Kakashi didn't wait for the scything kick. He jumped backwards, turned and slipped into the woods. Two clones were dispatched quickly to keep his rival company. Behind him, Gai was already on the chase again. Good. Another leap – forming seals in midair - and Kakashi was crouching on a tree branch about three meters above the ground.

Gai came rushing at him like a tsunami. He had no idea what was about to hit him. Chakra was boiling inside Kakashi, ready to explode. " Katon: Gōkakyū no jutsu!" Gai's luck was that he hadn't left the ground yet; he stopped mid-run, his feet digging into the earth like a plow. Kakashi could see his eyes widening through the haze of hot air, as the flames erupted.

Gai had thrown up his arms to cover his face, which explained the smell of burnt synthetic fabrics. The sleeves of his suit were singed, but when he lowered his defense - he had to, since the second clone was using that very moment to attack him from behind – Kakashi caught sight of his unharmed eyebrows. He almost laughed.

This was his chance though. Without further thought, he launched himself at Gai, feeling his skin tighten when he passed through the heated area in front of him. He went for his opponent's currently unprotected side.

As planned, the clone had jumped out from his hiding spot as soon as the flames had cleared, attacking Gai with a kunai. Pressured like this, Gai was reduced to defensive maneuvers. He was blocking the attacker awkwardly with one arm, while Kakashi happily kept his other limbs occupied.

Finally Gai landed a blow to the clone's throat, dispelling him in a cloud of smoke. Kakashi still pressed him with quick jabs and kicks, taking advantage of Gai's unfortunate position as long as he could. Gai had lost some momentum from having to dodge the fire and fighting off the clone. With Kakashi this close there was no room for his signature roundhouse kicks.

But the advantage was wearing off fast. Gai had collected himself, and close combat was starting to become too exhausting for Kakashi. Gai's reflexes were just a little bit keener than his; he had to be on his toes constantly, otherwise that tiny difference was going to cost him.

Punches and kicks whooshed past his ears left and right. Blocking and dodging in time was all he could do. Suddenly, a dull pain shot through his stomach as Gai landed a hit. Kakashi doubled over, instinctively trying to protect himself from further injury. In a fluid movement, Gai dropped into a crouch and swept his feet out from under him.

Kakashi hit the – thankfully – soft ground, small twigs and leaves breaking his fall somewhat. Before he had time to pull himself together, Gai was on top of him, probably hoping to end the whole thing by rendering him unable to move.

As Gai grappled for dominance, his knee pressed painfully into Kakashi's thigh. Their bodies were aligned imperfectly; Kakashi struggling to worm his way out from under him, while Gai did his best to make use of his superior weight. He couldn't get a hold of Kakashi's arms in time, however.

Kakashi formed the seals behind Gai's back – a mock-embrace – and Gai found himself wrapped around a log in less than five seconds. Breathlessly, Kakashi snickered at the fairly ridiculous sight. His stomach still throbbed, probably already spectacularly bruised. " Should I leave you two a—"

Throwing a log at someone's head when they were in the middle of a sentence was rather rude, Kakashi thought. He would have liked to tell Gai so, but sadly he was already up and charging. There was a lightness he felt now, that was dangerously inappropriate to the situation. It felt good, though, so he decided to run with it for the moment.

And running was what he did, no need to turn around to check either, since he could hear Gai following him – could almost feel his breath on the back of his neck. He burst out of the dim forest onto the blindingly bright meadow. The sun had travelled west a bit, the fight was dragging on.

Gai was letting him run, hoping to tire him out for all he knew. Kakashi spun around, facing the other man, who- to his surprise- was still at the edge of forest. Watching, waiting.

The distance was perfect. Getting through forty-four hand seals took even Kakashi a few seconds. From where he stood, Gai would be able to see exactly what he was doing and act accordingly, so maybe this was just a waste of chakra. It should keep him away from Kakashi for a while though.

His fingers flew through the seals. Gai stormed towards him. Kakashi tensed, an attack was the last thing he had expected. Rat – boar – rooster. Done. Too late to turn back now. " Suiton: Suiryūdan no jutsu!" Massive amounts of water were tearing towards Gai, who didn't even try to dodge. Like a man possessed, he kept running. Kakashi couldn't believe his eyes. The water dragon crashed into Gai with full force, but he hardly even stopped.

"Dynamic Entry!" Gai jumped into flying kick position, trailing droplets of water. The air around him sparkled with them. Kakashi thought his brain would shut down when he realized that - thanks to _his _jutsu – a rainbow was now serving as backdrop to Gai's favorite attack.

Stunned as he was by the sheer tackiness of the scene, it took all his elite jounin reflexes to prevent his face from meeting the sole of Gai's sandal up close and personal. He lunged to the side, slipping a little on the wet grass. The whole meadow seemed to be drenched from the water technique now, muddy ground sucking on his sandals. This was his moment.

Instinctively, Kakashi formed the seals of his next attack. Gai, having landed a little awkwardly after missing his mark, was in mid-turn, when Kakashi charged, chakra chirping mockingly in his right hand.

With a gasp Gai caught Kakashi's wrist. Unable to counter the force of Kakashi's thrust, he only managed to deflect the attack slightly, electric blue chakra grazing his side. He didn't go down, however. Instead his hand tightened painfully on Kakashi's wrist, their eyes meeting. Kakashi chose to punish himself by not evading Gai's angry and hurt gaze.

Then, abruptly, he was tossed aside like trash, stumbling, and falling onto the grass a few meters away from Gai. The soaked ground was refreshingly cool beneath his body. Kakashi wanted to stay there, listening to his thundering heartbeat. He wondered if Gai would come and beat him into the ground now. He certainly deserved it.

And yet he couldn't stop there. He still felt this drive. He rolled onto his back and sat up. Gai was standing in the same spot, he hadn't moved a millimeter. He was watching Kakashi out of narrowed eyes. Kakashi stood, like a marionette that was pulled up on its strings.

He slipped a hand into his pocket, feeling cold metal. Clutching the kunai, he went in for another attack. This time, Gai made it hurt. There was an edge to it now, desperation in himself and something else in Gai. After a minute Kakashi tasted blood, ten seconds later he tasted dirt. He wiped it off his mask and kept Gai at bay with a salve of shuriken.

A plan was taking shape in the back of his mind. First of all he had to drive Gai to the edge of the clearing, a few throwing weapons would do the trick. Then—

He never got further. Kakashi had been hurling shuriken and kunai at his opponent, already preoccupied with the next steps of his strategy, while Gai kept his distance and dodged effortlessly, obviously waiting for Kakashi's next significant move.

Kakashi threw two kunai in Gai's general direction, wondering as he let them go whether he had brought enough to get Gai where he wanted him, just as Gai slipped.

It was surreal.

Stupid.

Gai slipped and fell, reflexively trying to break his fall with his hands, leaving himself completely open to the kunai. And Kakashi knew that was it. All those lessons at the academy about calculating trajectories, he had aced all the tests, passed all his exams. But he had failed in life and he was failing again.

The moment seemed to last forever. Time stretched thin until it frayed. Gai oh so slowly turning his head towards the kunai. One would hit his chest, the other his face. Kakashi had sent them flying and now there was nothing he could do, but watch Gai fall.

He felt his eyes widening, a sudden pulse of chakra and his vision went blurry. He was staring into the abyss, a vacuum that sucked all the life out of him. Sky-blue and grass green seemed to melt, bleeding together with dancing spots of red and black.

An image of Gai, face covered in blood. Dead.

_It's my fault. I killed him._

All other colours were swirling around inside his mind, vanishing as if they were running down a drain. All gone except for—

Red and—

_**Black.**_


	6. Chapter 6

—_White_

Consciousness returned in flashes.

Kakashi found himself struggling against the sheets tangled around his limbs. The air around him was heavy with a sweet smell. Cicadas cried mournfully. It wasn't night or day, but something in between.

Someone must have opened the window while Kakashi was sleeping; now a slight breeze was scratching at the blinds. Kakashi shivered in his paper-thin hospital gown. It stuck to his hot, itchy skin.

He needed to find Gai.

Kakashi tried to free himself from the blankets. They were so tightly wound around him, they chafed his wrists. He squirmed and pulled until he broke into cold sweat. Unceremoniously, the blankets slid aside, exposing the restraints beneath them.

Slack-jawed, Kakashi stared at his wrist. Red marks had appeared where the stiff material had cut into his flesh. He was panicking despite himself, not because of the situation itself – he had been through much worse – but because it wasn't _right_. And that meant—

A sudden noise drew his attention. Fine powder rained down on his face, Kakashi whipped around. Cracks were running along the ceiling like snakes trying to hide from the light.

The restraints would not give, sooner would his wrists. There were bones in his thumbs he could break to escape, he remembered dimly. It was too late, though, the ceiling was crumbling; the sweet smell intensified. Decay.

To be buried alive, Kakashi thought, would be only fitting for him.

When the darkness came down, bat-like, he closed one eye and opened the other to catch a glimpse of Obito's spirit.

* * *

><p>"Kakashi-san? Are you awake?" Kakashi looked up into the distraught face of a young medic, who was grabbing his shoulders and giving him gentle shakes with annoying irregularity.<p>

"Are you okay?" He asked, articulating every word carefully in a clear and loud voice, as if Kakashi was losing his hearing instead of his mind.

"No," Kakashi answered in his most ʻeager to be helpfulʼ voice. "I'm not."

* * *

><p>"I think I'm cracking," Kakashi stated matter of factly. His own choice of words sent a shiver down his spine.<p>

"You don't say." Tsunade leaned back into the plastic chair she had brought for their talk and folded her arms. "You've had a few night terrors, but all in all I'd still say you're doing much better. You're awake for one thing."

He couldn't help but agree with this. Partly at least. Ever since he had woken up for the first time, he hadn't been able to keep track of complicated matters like the passage of minutes, hours or days, he knew, however, that it hadn't been that long and he already managed to sit up by himself, eat and make his way to the bathroom without help. In many ways he had recovered.

In other ways, he was much worse.

"I don't know if we're really having this conversation right now or if I'm just imagining it. I don't know if I'm really here at all."

Tsunade frowned. "You think you're hallucinating this?"

"I don't know what's real anymore. I _knew_ I'd killed Gai, but you're telling me I didn't—"

He broke off. Tsunade had gotten up and come closer while he spoke. Now she leaned over him, certain parts of her anatomy brushing his chest. He fought the urge to look down, meeting her penetrating stare instead. Her face was close enough to kiss. It was nothing short of terrifying.

And then in one fluid motion she swung her right arm back and forward again with a sharp _whoosh _and Kakashi thought that he might be quick enough to catch her wrist, except that just as he had finished thinking that thought, her hand collided with his face.

He swore he could the feel individual impact of each of her five fingers as hot pain exploded all over the side of his face with an intensity that drowned all his other senses, leaving him momentarily deaf to the no doubt very satisfying_ slap._

"Ouch, that stings." Tsunade was still shaking her hand and flexing her fingers by the time he managed to peel himself off of the pillow that had broken his fall a little. It was a miracle that he hadn't been catapulted out of the bed altogether.

Kakashi gaped at her.

"Did that feel real? I thought it might be more effective than a pinch."

He took in his surroundings – he'd made a habit of it by now, checking for signs of… well, madness, to be honest. His cheek burned, there'd be a glowing red handprint if he peeled away the mask, he was sure of it. The window was closed. The room smelled unpleasantly of hospital. The thin crack in the ceiling showed no intention of moving any time soon.

"More or less."

With a sigh, she let herself fall into the chair again. "You know, I warned you that something like this might happen."

If she had, he sure didn't remember.

"What do you mean?"

She glared. "I told you to leave it, didn't I? You shouldn't have forced yourself. Your body could handle it – somehow. But your mind… well… I don't think I have to elaborate at this point."

"You mean, I'm going to stay like this?" Some of his dread at the prospect must have shined through because the Hokage softened.

"No, my guess is you'll get better – it just hit you harder that it would have an Uchiha."

Instinctively, Kakashi reached up to the bandage covering the eye.

"What did Gai say?" He had asked this question before, probably more than once. He couldn't help it, in sanity or madness, his thoughts spiraled back to that point.

"Not much, certainly nothing useful. You two sparred; you passed out. That's it," she answered dismissively. "You can ask him yourself when he gets back, but I doubt he'll be much help."

He remained silent, reluctant to voice his disagreement, but when she peered at him with narrowed eyes, she seemed to be able to read his mind, although he had kept his expression carefully contained.

"You're still worried that he's really dead, aren't you?"

"Killing him is the only thing I remember," Kakashi said sadly, knowing that that memory would haunt him forever. Real or not, it had already taken its rightful place next to all his other failures.

Tsunade got up. "He brought you here and I talked to him. I doubt that I hallucinated that. Besides, from what he told me, I guess you got your wish."

He suspected that as well. His eye felt strange and it had sucked up most of his chakra within seconds. It was different now, more powerful.

And more dangerous.

She was about to leave, then paused in the doorway to turn to him once more.

"Kakashi, I know it may not seem like it right now, but you were lucky. This time. Be careful. A shinobi of your rank is responsible for a lot more than just his own life."

With one last look, Tsunade closed the door behind her and left him at the mercy of his mind.

* * *

><p>Sunlight filtered into the room, painting a grid of light and shadow across Kakashi's blanket-covered torso. Only Half-awake, he groaned softly. Even though most of the sunshine was kept out by the blinds, the room was still too bright for Kakashi's sensitive eye.<p>

He struggled against the tight, over-starched sheets. During the night they had got tangled around his limbs like restraints.

"You should greet the morning more with more enthusiasm, rival! Every new day is a new beginning isn't it?"

Kakashi sat up so abruptly it made his head swim. There was only one person in all of Konoha who talked like that. Well, two actually, Kakashi thought dazedly, but the person standing in the shadows was too broad and tall to be Lee.

Kakashi thought he could actually feel his heart skip a beat. "Gai."

He moved, his back to Kakashi, towards the window. Like a musician's fingers his played over the blinds as if they were dancing over the strings of an instrument.

Light – shadow –light– shadow –

_Light. _

Gai forced the blinds apart, flooding the room in brightness that seemed to drown out everything else.

Kakashi held up a hand to shield his eye; he grit his teeth against the sudden painful onslaught of light.

The room was white and the fuzzy black of silhouettes painted on a backdrop of nothingness.

"Every new beginning is a chance to redeem oneself, isn't it?"

At the words, at the unfamiliar cold tone of Gai's voice, something constricted deep inside Kakashi. The left side of his face throbbed as Gai's hand fell away from the blinds.

With the room sliced and diced in light and shadow again, Gai turned towards the bed – towards Kakashi, who sat frozen, still stuck, trying to shield himself. From what, he was only just beginning to realize.

Gai's face was a mess of black and red. A spiral, tunnel, dark bloody hole under his thick left eyebrow, a thin-lipped sneer baring blood-stained, ivory-white beast-teeth.

"Look what you've done to me," he said, stepping closer until Kakashi could smell the sweetness of death on him. "And for what?" Gai hissed, feral.

_For whom_, Kakashi thought miserably.

* * *

><p>"The night terrors are fewer and farther apart and you seem more focused and coherent. All in all, I'm pleased," Tsunade said, leaning back in her customary chair.<p>

"I don't feel particularly—"

"You're _better,_" she interrupted him with an impatient wave of her hand. "Now, I have patients here who didn't land themselves in here because of nothing but their own pigheadedness."

She was about to get up when Kakashi decided to throw caution to the wind; it wasn't like the Hokage was interested in his personal life, it wasn't like she hadn't seen him vulnerable before.

"When is Gai coming back?"

She sighed, looking down at him, taking him in in all his patheticness, no doubt.

"His worry-date is in two days," she replied. The wording was so very like her, Kakashi thought, avoiding a direct promise of Gai returning. This was the world they lived in. He felt it weigh on him like a lump of lead.

When she finally turned away, her fingertips brushed his arm lightly. He couldn't tell whether it was accidentally or on purpose, whether it was meant as a comfort or not and whether it made him feel better or worse.

He listened to the fading clacks of her heels on the hard floor.

_Worry-date?_ Kakashi thought bitterly, _I'm already worried._

* * *

><p>Kakashi blinked the sleep from his eye, feeling disoriented. Something had woken him from his afternoon nap, and for once it hadn't been his own hoarse screams.<p>

There was a soft knock on the door to his room, then the sound of a man clearing his throat. Kakashi was wide awake instantly, feeling himself tense up expectantly. He struggled into a sitting position and did his best to smooth the sheets somewhat, to look, well, a little less like a frail hospital patient.

"Come in," he called. Had his palms always been this sweaty? Should he maybe grab one of his books to look more casual? But the door opened before he could dig up one of the volumes from under his pillow, so he folded his arms instead and sat up a little straighter for good measure.

"Yo," his visitor greeted in a tone so lackluster it might have come from himself. Kakashi slumped back against the headboard in disappointment. Behind a big fruit basket Asuma craned his neck to investigate the source of the dull thump, that the collision of Kakashi's back with the headboard of his bed had produced. "You okay?" he asked. "Heard you'd returned to the world of the living."

Kakashi waved his hand in a vague come-closer-gesture. "I'm fine," he said. "Thanks, you can put that down over there." He pointed to a small side-table next to his bed.

"It's from all of us," Asuma explained without going into who exactly that entailed; he seemed quite happy to get rid of his burden, though, setting it down a little too hastily and nearly dropping a few apples in the process. However, being a ninja came in handy in any fruit juggling emergency.

"So…" Kakashi said, once his visitor had settled into the plastic chair.

"So?" Asuma clearly had no bedside manner at all.

"What did I miss?" Kakashi prompted.

"You mean apart from your student passing the preliminaries?"

"Ah." So this was where this was going. Kakashi had thought he'd detected some tension when Asuma'd entered. He would have to try to appease him; technically he owed the other jounin now. Going through that with Sakura would have been his job… Or Tsunade's. Probably Tsunade's.

"How did she do?"

"She passed."

"So you've said." He was beginning to understand why Gai hated his ʻhip and modern attitudeʼ so much. This was _infuriating_. But Kakashi wasn't the type to lose his cool. Ever. And if Asuma wanted to play it like that, he would wait. He let silence stretch between them. He let its non-entity fill the room.

Asuma's hands crept into the pockets of his pants.

"What the hell were you two doing?" Surprisingly he didn't sound as angry as Kakashi had expected. Merely tired, worn-out.

He looked past Asuma, out of the window. A small bird flitted past. A sparrow, probably.

"So it's going to be like that. You're almost as bad as Gai..."

"You talked to Gai?"

"He wouldn't say anything either, no, that's not true, he wouldn't shut up, but he didn't answer my questions, nothing but his usual Springtime of Youth this and Eternal Rivalry that nonsense." Asuma shook his head; his fingers moved beneath the fabric of his pants. "Can I smoke in here?"

"This is a hospital room," Kakashi stated evenly.

"Tch." Antsy was a fairly accurate description of Asuma's state, Kakashi thought. It wasn't like him either. If there'd ever been a contest for most laid-back shinobi, Asuma would have given him a run for his money.

Now he could hear the crinkle of plastic and paper in Asuma's pocket, betraying the other's restless fingers. He decided to give his colleague a break.

"Maybe if you lean out of the window," Kakashi suggested." But if Shizune catches you, I'll deny having said that."

"I wouldn't expect anything else," Asuma said tersely. He was at the window in two strides, opened it roughly and lit his cigarette with the impatience of an addict.

Kakashi watched him breathe smoke for a while.

"We've got a lot of work, you know." Asuma offered between drags.

His back was to Kakashi, his eyes probably not so much on the view of Konoha before him but the distant horizon.

"People having to take your missions because you're in hospital for something that – _allegedly_ – happened during _a spar, _that's not right," he said finally.

"I'm sorry," Kakashi said because he couldn't think of anything else to say except for, "Thank you."

"Don't thank _me_."

He wondered whether he should tell Asuma to thank Kurenai for him, but decided against it.

It wouldn't bring her back any sooner, and, like the Hokage, he had learned the hard way to not take anyone's return for granted.

* * *

><p>The sound of the sliding door opening woke him up.<p>

Kakashi groaned, wiping his brow. The bandages over his left eye were rough against the back of his hand. Outside the birds were just waking, too. His room was cast in tones between grey and black. It wasn't really light yet. The small hours right before dawn, Kakashi guessed.

Hospital staff, then.

The medics came and went at regular intervals, checking temperature, blood pressure, pulse and whatever else it was medics had to check.

He would lie still and endure, his eye closed, trying to go back to sleep.

The footsteps came closer; then the scrape of the chair and a slight creak as someone settled into it.

Almost delirious from a sudden feeling of premonition, Kakashi opened his eye and rolled on his side to see the person he had been waiting for all this time sitting next to his bed as if he'd never been away.

"Ah, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you," Gai said, scratching the back of his head sheepishly.


	7. Chapter 7

"Gai…" Kakashi studied his visitor. He couldn't quite believe it yet. Too many times a similar setup had ended with him waking sweaty and shaking from a nightmare. However, even in the semi darkness Kakashi could tell that his vision of Gai was too clear, too vivid, too consistent to be a dream.

Gai sat in the chair Tsunade had vacated a few hours before. He looked if not exhausted, then at least slightly winded. His normally impeccable bowl cut was somewhat asymmetric as well; strands of hair sticking out awkwardly on the left side of his head, where he had probably brushed it out of his eyes at some point. It had to be sticky with dried sweat to have stayed stuck like that.

Now that Gai was close and Kakashi focused on him, he could smell him too. Almost completely smothered by the biting hospital smells, Kakashi could detect a faint whiff of Gai.

And if that had not been enough, Kakashi was convinced when Gai casually covered his hand with his own.

"Are you surprised? I raced here at the speed of light! Frankly, I thought my rival would be out of the hospital by now!" Gai leaned forward when he spoke, as if he was whispering… which he really wasn't.

"I'm touched by your concern," he drawled. The response was pavlovian – Gai bragged and challenged, Kakashi shot him down with indifference. But this wasn't the conversation he had expected. After what had happened how could they just go back to normal?

Gai patted his hand in a manner that was usually insufferably patronizing, now though, it just confused Kakashi. "It seems like you're getting old, taking this long to recover, Kakashi! Was I too much for you?" The little ping sound, Gai's teeth made when he grinned down at him, pulled Kakashi out of his confusion.

Looking – still somewhat dazedly – at Gai's hand, he noticed the dark rust-colored stain on his torn sleeve, his scraped knuckles.

Gai had come directly from his mission. He hadn't gone home; he hadn't showered or changed. He had hurried straight to the hospital because he was worried. And he had not once mentioned what had happened in the forest because he trusted Kakashi. They were friends, but their friendship was based more on what wasn't said than on what was.

If Kakashi didn't bring it up, then Gai would never mention it again. Things would just go back to the way they had been before. That was unacceptable.

"Gai," Kakashi began. "What happened?"

"Eh, you don't remember?" Gai looked honestly puzzled.

"No, that's not it. I want to know what happened after you stumbled." _When I almost killed you_, Kakashi added in his thoughts.

Gai shrugged. "You passed out. Then I carried you back to the village on my broad and manly shoulders!" He gave Kakashi a thumbs-up and winked.

"That's not what I meant." Kakashi sighed. Gai was having that effect on him again. "And you know it," he added accusingly.

Gai's gaze flickered. He avoided Kakashi's eye, but didn't respond.

"The kunai I threw at you…" Kakashi prompted. He could feel himself losing his drive as well. What was done was done, after all. Maybe he should just let it rest.

"Vanished." Gai was studying the wall intently, his face turned away from Kakashi. On the side of his neck, Kakashi could make out a small cut across the tendon. It had already scabbed over. He felt the sudden urge to reach out and touch it.

"My eye?"

"I couldn't see, I was too far away."

Also, there had been kunai flying towards his face, those had probably ranked higher on Gai's list of priorities. Beneath the mask, Kakashi bit his lip, bracing himself.

"At first, I thought it was a genjutsu… but that whole fight —" At a loss for words, he shook his head.

"Gai, I'm—"

"_No_," Gai interrupted him forcefully before he could complete the apology. "I agreed to your terms. I don't go back on my word! And I have no regrets!"

"You can't just say you have no regrets; it doesn't work like that." He was overwhelmed by an immense fatigue suddenly. Kakashi felt it seep into his bones. And if Gai didn't have regrets… Kakashi was sure he had enough for the both of them.

"Who says it doesn't work?" Gai asked gently; now his voice had taken on a hospital-appropriate volume. Gai's grip on his hand tightened ever so slightly.

"Gai, I nearly killed you. I could've. " He didn't dare to reciprocate Gai's touch. Frustrated with himself, he echoed his dream. "And for what?"

The hand withdrew; incomprehensively, Kakashi felt bereft.

"What? What do you mean _what_? You did it, didn't you? That's why you passed out. You activated it. I _know_ you did!" Clearly, Gai was having none of that. His conviction was unshakable . He folded his arms and glared at Kakashi – the frown on his face made his eyebrows look like an arrow pointing at his nose, they looked like they had been drawn on his forehead in thick black felt-tip pen. "I will not tolerate you giving up! And I will not tolerate this _self-pity_."

Actual disgust underlined that last word.

"What makes you think that?" Kakashi asked.

"I spoke to Tsunade-sama when you were unconscious," Gai replied, self-importance back with a vengeance. "Like I said,_ I_ helped you." As if on cue, the first real rays of morning sunshine slid into the room, accompanied by birdsong.

Kakashi sighed again. It seemed like Gai would always be Gai in the end, nothing could shake him. He was truly like a rock. A big, green, overly dramatic rock.

_This_, Kakashi thought, _is something to be thankful for__._

In the end they talked about this and that.

Gai's mission, which he described as "a triumphant victory for justice" and then the chuunin exam preliminaries, about which Gai spoke as if he was describing the epic last battles of legendary shinobi against some cosmic horror. It was all hyperbole and wild gesticulation.

At some point Gai's hand returned to its previous spot, easing a pain Kakashi hadn't known he felt.

* * *

><p>Apparently Kakashi had fallen asleep to the rise and fall of Gai's voice. When he woke up again, Gai had left and his blanket had been pulled up to his chin. So what had woken him?<p>

There was movement in the room. Bleary eyed, Kakashi tracked the young woman's brisk steps past his bed to the window, which she opened with a little sigh. Her back was turned to him, but he could easily recognize her anyway. Her pink hair was a dead giveaway.

Like Asuma, she leaned out of the window, gazing out as if she was searching for something specific. Or someone. There it was again, that twinge of regret. For a moment Kakashi considered pretending to be asleep, just to avoid a conversation with his student. But he'd have to face her at some point. Might as well get it over with now.

"Sakura," he said softly to get her attention without startling her too badly.

She didn't flinch, didn't even seem surprised that he was awake. He wondered if she had been waiting for him to awake in the first place.

She turned to him and smiled.

Kakashi pushed himself up on his elbows; it just felt wrong to lie in bed like a frail old man with Sakura at his bedside.

"Kakashi-sensei, wait, I'll help you," she called immediately, hurrying over. And that was just unacceptable. He could already feel his dignity crumble beneath her soft hands. As fast as he could, he managed to pull himself up on his own, even if it did leave him a little breathless and dizzy.

Sakura stopped in her tracks, her outstretched arms falling to her sides uselessly. Kakashi was shocked at the hurt expression that crossed her face. Already he had managed to start them off on the wrong foot.

"Are you feeling better?" She asked.

"Yeah, somewhat."

"I'm glad."

And that appeared to have exhausted their repertoire completely right there. Every word they spoke just seemed to add another piece to a puzzle and with every added piece it became more and more obvious that there was a gaping hole in picture and that just reminded them of the fact that it was doomed to stay unfinished for the foreseeable future.

Naruto and Sasuke. They didn't speak their names but their shadowy silhouettes – their absence – loomed over them like a ghost. It was the elephant in the corner. Obvious to both of them but impossible to acknowledge.

Therefore talking to Sakura was just depressing.

He could tell that she shared his feelings, too. If her insecurely wandering gaze, that never wanted to rest on anything particular in the room – least of all him –, and her shifting stance were anything to go by.

Well, there was one topic that seemed safe enough.

"So, Gai tells me you passed the preliminaries with ease," Kakashi said, smiling his mostly concealed smile. "He couldn't stop praising you." To be fair, Kakashi had zoned out right at the beginning of Gai's account of the exam, but when he zoned back in ten minutes later, Gai was still going on about how "full of youthful passion" Sakura had been.

She actually blushed a little; her cheeks matching her hair. It reminded him of the looks she cast towards Sasuke when she was twelve and she still thought that her life was going to turn out like some fairytale.

However, the pink spots were gone as fast as they had appeared and then all Sakura did was say, "I haven't passed yet" matter-of-factly; she sounded like Tsunade-sama.

"Maa, Sakura-chan, don't push yourself. I'm sure you'll do great." He didn't know how to respond to her, so without thinking twice, he had fallen back into old habits; encouraging her with nothing to base his optimism on. He hadn't seen her fight once since Naruto had left with Jiraiya.

"Thanks, Kakashi-sensei," she said and there was no real feeling behind those words either. "I probably shouldn't disturb you any longer."

Not waiting for a reply, she just turned and left in a brisk stride. "Sakura," he called after her feebly, but it hung in the air unnoticed.

She was angry with him, and it wasn't like he hadn't given her reason to be. During the preliminaries, she must have been the only participant whose teacher wasn't present. Then again, that wasn't really true. Tsunade had been there and Tsunade was her teacher now.

But Sakura'd wanted him to attend.

For some reason.

Kakashi sank back into his pillow. He'd never been much good at understanding girls, and Sakura? When he'd first met her, she was just your ordinary teenage girl with a crush and dreams of romance and happy endings. Despite her solid skills, he had never been able to take her seriously. At best, he'd felt like he had to protect her.

But now things had changed. They had had to. When she had entered the exam last time, no one had known her; no one had expected anything from her. This time, however, she was the Hokage's apprentice. All eyes were on her and her performance would reflect on Tsunade-sama's reputation.

Sakura was under a lot of pressure. Reality was harsh.

And her dreams? Her dreams were a thing of the past.


	8. Chapter 8

"Hmm, " Tsunade-sama murmured, tapping her ballpoint pen against the clipboard she was studying. She frowned as if in deep thought, then declared suddenly, "I'm discharging you!"

"I'm sorry?" Kakashi gaped underneath his mask. _What a random way to announce an important decision like that!_

"Well, I want you to come in regularly for the next week, of course. If all goes well, I'll put you back on the mission roster after that," the Hokage told him. Suddenly, though, her face darkened like a pleasant summer day that was interrupted by a thunderstorm, and Kakashi was the unsuspecting picnicker, who ended up being struck by lightning.

"And another thing: you'll be at the chuunin exam finals. You _will _be there. Understood?" She leaned closer, eyes narrowed. Instinctively, Kakashi pressed back into the mattress, maybe he could just sink into it and vanish.

"I will," he answered. If his voice trembled a little, surely he could blame it on just being a little overwhelmed and still weak from his massive chakra loss– it certainly had nothing to do with fear.

"Good," Tsunade glared at him. "And if something should happen to you again, don't think I'm above dragging your unconscious body into the stadium and tying you to your seat."

He really didn't think she was.

* * *

><p>The last thing they did for him at the hospital was remove the bandage over his left eye. It hadn't covered an injury; there were no stitches to remove or anything like that, so it had only been a technicality.<p>

Still, the Hokage did it herself.

Finally, Kakashi went home, carrying his battered copies of Icha Icha under his arm.

* * *

><p>He only returned to his apartment to drop off the books and get a hitae-ate to cover the scarred eye, though. There was someone he had to visit, now that he was out of the hospital.<p>

"I'm sorry," he said. "I was too desperate, too reckless. I know you wouldn't have approved of this, but… I didn't know what to do."

Naturally, there was no answer.

Kakashi averted his eye. Here, the sounds of the village seemed distant and strange. He felt alone, removed from everything, except his past.

A breeze rustled through the trees.

Kakashi tilted his head up and stared into the picture-perfect blue sky. Above him, clouds, which looked like fluffy children's crayon drawings, hung seemingly motionless.

He sighed. There were things he had to face head-on, things he couldn't repress anymore.

In one fluid motion, Kakashi went down on his knee and pressed his right hand to that column of names – the ones that were precious to him. With his left hand, he pulled up his headband.

"Look," Kakashi whispered.

He hadn't expected it to be hard exactly, but he hadn't thought it would be this easy. Whatever had happened between him and Gai had shattered the lock on that particular door, or so it seemed, because all he had to do now was give it a little mental prod.

The sensation was like hot liquid oozing through his optic nerve. Just short of being painful, it was unpleasant, but not unbearable. He could feel it drain his chakra, though not in an unstoppable rush like before. He could control it. _Vaguely._

The hand that had been tracing the writing on the stone tenderly before, now had to be used to support himself.

"Look," Kakashi repeated. His fingers found purchase in the shallow carvings on the cenotaph's smooth surface. He shook his head and blinked, staunching the chakra-flow, before tugging the headband back into its usual place.

"Thank you, Obito." _Rin, Sensei. _

_I wouldn't be here without you._

* * *

><p>He didn't stay long after that. But he also knew that he couldn't just return home. Not before he had spoken to someone else first. Kakashi hesitated at the thought. He felt like procrastinating. He could always go home, he thought, spend the afternoon with one of his Icha Icha novels and avoid thinking about... anything really.<p>

But especially _him_.

The whole thing was weird and exasperating, much like the person in question. He did owe Gai an apology, however. So he had no choice.

Kakashi was done talking to the dead for that day; now he had to face the living.

It seemed disproportionally harder.

* * *

><p>Gai's apartment complex was in the centre of the village; before entering, Kakashi spent a good minute just staring up at his friend's windows on the top floor, first trying to determine whether he was home or not, then trying to determine whether the smoke coming out of the open kitchen window meant that there was a fire or that Gai was cooking.<p>

If he was lucky, it was only a fire.

* * *

><p>Kakashi managed the last set of stairs with only minimum panting, which filled him with no small amount of pride. Considering how much time he'd spent lying in bed recently, and the fact that he had just severely violated his doctor's orders, he had reason to be.<p>

It was so very like Gai to live on the top floor of a building that didn't have an elevator. Normally Kakashi wouldn't have bothered with the stairs at all, but would simply have climbed the building from the outside, using chakra.

In his current state that hadn't been an option, though.

Kakashi leaned against the doorframe. The distinct spicy smell of curry was wafting through the whole building, and, as he had known even back on the street, the source was behind Gai's door. Comparatively – when it came to Gai's cooking – today's was one of the tamest odors Kakashi had ever smelled coming from his friend's kitchen.

It wasn't that Gai couldn't cook, it was that he couldn't follow a recipe. He always came up with ideas to improve them, and his ideas were always _completely _insane.

After all, this was the man who had added mouthwash to his miso soup, claiming that this made it a Wholesome and Healthy Meal, which not only tasted great, but also guaranteed fresh breath for the rest of the day.

Some people said that Gai's cooking was the only thing that was deadlier than his taijutsu; they certainly had a point.

Kakashi wiped a drop of sweat from his temple. The heat was sweltering up here. Being on the top floor, Gai's apartment was hot in the summer and cold in winter, not that Gai minded. Kakashi was in full uniform, however, and it wasn't exactly pleasant. His mask seemed glued to his face. And were sweat-dampened fabric didn't stick to his skin, beads of sweat formed.

Gai probably thought air-conditioning was unmanly, or he used this hellish heat to advertise the "lightness" of his horrible spandex suit.

And Kakashi had been standing in front of Gai's door for at least five minutes now. He'd either have to knock within the next seconds or leave before anyone saw him lurking around like some stalker.

Why did this seem so hard all of a sudden?

Annoyed with himself, Kakashi briskly lifted his hand and knocked in three short raps. Then he shoved his hands into his pockets and slouched, trying to look as casual as possible.

The effort was completely wasted, however, for, as the door was almost torn from its hinges and Gai appeared, shouting, "Ah, you're early, my cute — Huh?", he was confronted not only with the usual sight of Gai – which was already a small shock for unprepared people – but with _half-naked Gai_ – which was on a completely different level, even for someone with as much Gai-related experience as Kakashi.

"Uh," was what came out of Kakashi's mouth instead of the "yo" he'd wanted to say. He was dumbstruck; also, there was suddenly a suspicious tickling sensation in his nose. Well, he was wearing his mask, so any strange and inexplicable nosebleeds would be covered.

And why would he be having nosebleeds anyway?

Well, Gai's naked torso was striking. There was no doubt about that. Not to mention that it glistened with sweat.

_Muscles._

_Covered in sparkly _sweat.

_I really need to look away_.

_Now._

It wasn't easy though. Gai was wearing his usual green spandex suit, but – probably because of the heat – he wore it unzipped down to his navel and had tied the sleeves around his waist as well to keep the upper half from flopping about uselessly. He wasn't wearing anything else. No vest, no belt, no sandals.

Gai's naked upper body was a sight to behold. No one could deny that. He reminded Kakashi of the anatomy lessons at the academy; every muscle was developed to perfection. If Gai taught there, he wouldn't have to bother with the plastic model or drawings in books. He could just take off his shirt and show them all on his body. And despite the ridiculous amounts of food he put away, there wasn't one gram of fat on him.

A small scar over his collarbone caught Kakashi's eye. He remembered putting it there. It had been during a sparring session with weapons more than a decade ago when his kunai had glanced off of Gai's nunchaku awkwardly and caught the other boy there.

The wound hadn't been deep and Gai'd been too proud to stop sparring and go to the hospital with "a little scratch like that", but in the end it had become infected and had landed him in the hospital for a few days.

Apparently, that incident had taught them nothing.

Kakashi tore his gaze away; it wasn't like this was the first time he had seen Gai's body. There really was no reason for this to affect him like it did.

In the meantime, Gai seemed to have recovered from his shock. "Kakashi, I wasn't expecting you. Please, come in," he said, and when Kakashi didn't react, grabbed his arm and pulled him over the threshold.

Kakashi felt a little dazed. Inside, he removed his sandals as if on autopilot and let Gai usher him into the kitchen, where it was even hotter and the smell of curry was downright overwhelming.

"Sit down, rival!" Gai practically forced him into a chair, turned back to the bubbling pot on the stove and began to stir enthusiastically. He looked over his shoulder at Kakashi, studying him thoughtfully for a second. "There's green tea in the fridge, should I pour you a cup?" When Kakashi declined politely, he frowned and asked, "Aren't you hot? Feel free to take your vest off at least!"

Kakashi obeyed −mostly because it really was suffocating, but also because he wasn't keen on fighting with Gai about something so trivial −and hung it over the back of his chair. He took in the massive pot on the stove and ventured, "Isn't that a bit much even for you Gai?"

Gai positively beamed. "It's not just for me! My cute students are coming to dinner. We're celebrating their effortless victories at the preliminaries!" His face fell. "Sadly, due to my mission, we didn't have time to do this right after the fights."

He brightened again. "Would you like to try a bowl?" He gave a thumbs-up and said, in a manner disturbingly reminiscent of advertisements, "It's super spicy and super healthy! It's the perfect food for the Springtime of Life!" His teeth gleamed audibly.

Kakashi sniffed. Normally, he wouldn't dream of eating anything Gai had cooked, but something was off here. "It doesn't smell like your usual curry…" That particular smell could melt nose hair.

"That's because it isn't." Gai shook his head in regret and proceeded to stir a little less enthusiastically. "My beloved students have challenged me to cook a curry according to this recipe." He thrust a piece of paper towards Kakashi, who glanced at it and smiled. So Gai's brats had found a way around their teacher's abysmal cooking. Maybe there was still hope for them.

"I'll take you up on that offer," he said to his own surprise. He didn't even like curry, but somehow, he was in the mood for it now.

Glowing with pride, Gai made up a bowl for him, placed it before Kakashi and turned back around immediately afterwards. Because he didn't want to see Kakashi's face. Didn't want to break that unspoken rule between them.

Kakashi pulled down his mask, feeling his stomach twist at the sight of Gai's back. Of course, Gai'd seen his face before, but only in battle and only ever accidentally. And he would avert his eyes within a second, wordlessly and without being asked.

Kakashi ate. The first spoonful burned his tongue.

"And, how is it?" Gai asked eagerly without turning.

"I don't like it," Kakashi said.

"Gyaah! So cold! How heartless!" Gai cried, slumping forward, struck by grief. He didn't turn around.

"Gai." Kakashi set his spoon down shakily. It clattered against the bowl. He couldn't put a name to what he was feeling.

"I know!" Gai shot up, coming back to life. He shook his fist threateningly towards the wall, he was still facing. "I challenge you! To a cooking contest! HAH, and then we'll see—"

"Gai." There was a tremor in Kakashi's voice, something close to despair. He tried to swallow it, but it stuck in his throat. "Turn around."

Gai stiffened. He dropped his fist. A muscle in his back twitched. There was a scar there, cutting diagonally across his broad shoulders. Kakashi knew that he had not been there when Gai had got that injury. Because he wouldn't have let that happen. They watched each other's backs.

He turned slowly, hesitantly. He hung his head; his gaze was fixed on the floor. "Kakashi, what's wrong?" he asked.

"Look at me," Kakashi commanded, ignoring his question.

Gai looked up; his eyes widened only a tiny fraction. Then his gaze flickered to the left, then down, then right. He specialized in avoiding Kakashi's eyes after all…

Kakashi sighed. He got up. The scrape of his chair against the floor sounded unnaturally loud. Gai glanced at him, then glanced away again. He didn't seem to know what to make of the situation.

"There's something I wanted to say to you," Kakashi began, but had to interrupt himself, when he picked up a certain odor. "Your curry's burning."

"Ah!" Gai whipped around and turned off the heat. Then he turned back to Kakashi, who smiled a little. Gai didn't seem to know what to make of that either.

"What I wanted to say was, I'm sorry and thank you." He hated how casual that sounded. Like he didn't really mean it. What kind of man was he that he couldn't say those words and sound like he meant them?

"There's no need to—"

"Yes, there is," Kakashi insisted. He knew what Gai was trying to say. No need to apologize, no need to thank, because everything they did for each other was a given. But what Gai had done for him was more than that. And what he'd almost done to Gai…

"I owe you an explanation."

Gai leaned back against the stove. He folded his arms over his chest defiantly. He didn't like this, Kakashi realized. Gai believed in the things he'd told himself ever since he was a little kid. He'd made up all these rules for himself and for their rivalry, and he hated breaking them. And now he sensed that Kakashi was about to break them.

He wasn't wrong.

"I risked your life. I almost killed you—"

"That's not—"

"No. Gai. I _could _have done it." Finally, there it was. The statement filled the room, like a bubble expanding endlessly; Kakashi felt it press down on him, holding him in place against his will.

Gai's mouth closed with an audible click of teeth; this time his eyes really widened. Kakashi only held his gaze because he owed Gai that much, but he wanted to look away. He wanted it more than anything.

Kakashi had certainly been ready to do it. The way he had fought that day… Almost effortlessly, he had turned into the emotionless weapon a shinobi was supposed to be. He had been on a self-imposed mission and he'd been willing to sacrifice everything for that.

Even his best friend, _especially _his best friend.

How ironic that all of it had been in order to make Obito's eye evolve, when Obito would have hated him for doing something like that.

"Why?" Gai asked, he seemed to be incapable of forcing out more than that one word. The last time Kakashi had seen him look this sad had been after Lee's fight against Gaara.

Kakashi swallowed thickly. Without his mask he felt naked and vulnerable.

"I lasted about three seconds against Itachi. If you hadn't come when you did, I'd probably be dead now… and I knew I needed it if I ever wanted to stand a chance, so I trained and trained, but nothing happened, so I… I don't know." It was a cowardly way to finish the sentence, so he tried again.

"It's my fault, I failed him. When I talked to Sasuke, if I'd been more honest, if I hadn't tried to mask my feelings, if I'd told him the whole story —" Kakashi broke off, embarrassed. It was stupid to talk like that, to whine. There was no point now, and, as a jounin, as Sasuke's teacher, he had to be ready for what was about to come, instead of regretting past mistakes.

"They'll come for Naruto again. They're not going to get him… as for Sasuke… if it comes to that. It has to be me. He was my student. And I owe it to Naruto and Sakura. I have to be the one. I have to be ready." And he was, maybe that was the truly terrifying part, that Kakashi knew he would be able to do what was necessary.

"Kakashi…" Gai's voice was shaky; he reached Kakashi in two long strides.

Had he wanted to, he could have evaded like he always did, but this time Kakashi didn't. When Gai's arms closed around him, he stood a little stiffly – arms hanging at his sides– and endured.

Gai's body radiated a heat that was nothing like the summer afternoon heat which had tormented Kakashi all day. It was pulsating and alive. Where Gai's body pressed against him (and it was almost everywhere), Kakashi felt his body respond to Gai's body heat, the hardness of his muscles, the smoothness of his skin. He was helpless against the onslaught.

Gai's arms were wrapped around him tightly, pressing the two of them together chest to chest and, due to their almost identical height, cheek to cheek. It was appallingly intimate, even more so, since Kakashi still wasn't wearing his mask. Gai's cheek was moist with tears, tears for Kakashi, maybe tears for Sasuke, too.

It was mortifying, and it was exactly what Kakashi needed. But it was too much; it had gone on too long. He lifted his arms; he'd form the seals behind Gai's back and vanish in a cloud of smoke and tomorrow, things would go back to normal. They'd never talk about this again.

Kakashi brought his hands into position and hesitated. The warmth that radiated off Gai's back pulled him in. For just a moment, he gave in. He let his hands come to rest on Gai's skin, returning the hug. It felt like he had been given something he had been missing all his life.

Automatically, Kakashi relaxed against Gai, laid his chin on his shoulder, his hold on the other man tightening at the same time. The rhythmically ebbing and swelling sound of his blood rushing through his body filled his ears, drowning out everything else.

Kakashi closed his eye. One of his hands slipped lower on Gai's sweat-slickened back.

Something went through Gai, he shifted the tiniest bit under Kakashi's unexpected touch. Only when his cheek rubbed against Kakashi's like a caress, was it that Kakashi realized Gai was slowly trying to pull away.

Startled, he pulled back as well, turning at the same time to get a look at Gai's expression. It was a mistake, of course. His lips brushed Gai's cheek in something like a kiss. Gai gasped and froze. Too close, Kakashi couldn't _wouldn't_ pull away. His lips brushed the corner of Gai's mouth, then moved further still until they reached Gai's lips, which weren't especially soft. They were moist and they tasted salty.

And yet, the fleeting touch sent tendrils of liquid heat reaching down his body.

However, no matter how much he wanted to, Kakashi knew he couldn't stay like that forever. As he felt Gai push him away oh-so-gently, it slowly dawned on him what he'd just done.

All of a sudden, there was an insistent knock on the door.

Kakashi let go of Gai and formed the seals without ever opening his eye. He vanished in a puff of smoke, just as he heard someone call Gai's name.


	9. Chapter 9

Kakashi sank onto his mattress and tried to come to terms with what he'd just done. Not an easy task.

He'd kissed Gai.

Kakashi groaned.

Then again, it had happened in the heat of the moment, their lips had only touched for a second, and… And, he realized, he could very possibly pass this off as an "accident." Gai'd probably buy it. He'd bought more outrageous lies than that. Not that this was such an outrageous lie. In some way it wasn't even a lie…

Except that it was and if Kakashi started lying to himself now, he really was doomed. It was high time to be honest with _himself_ at least. He cared about Gai. That wasn't a completely new development. But whatever happened, both he and Gai would always be shinobi first and everything else later.

And being a shinobi meant that the village would always come first, and even if you found someone, even if they truly loved you and you loved them back, even then, the best you could hope for was that you'd be the one to die first.

It was a bleak outlook, but it was also realistic.

The lingering aftertaste of Gai's curry had turned bitter in his mouth.

* * *

><p>Half an hour later Kakashi slipped out of his apartment. He'd come to a decision. For the next few days he'd leave Konoha to train up in the mountains, to think and to avoid Gai.<p>

Kissing Gai had been a moment of weakness, something that definitely shouldn't have happened, but, as with most actions, there was no way to undo it. So he could marinate in his misery like a teenager with a crush, or he could get on with his life and prepare for coming battles.

Now that he was on his feet again and had more or less completed his nin- and genjutsu training for the time being, Kakashi wanted to get in some actual physical training for once. It probably wasn't something Tsunade would approve of, but since he was on leave and didn't have to show up at the hospital for the next few days, he didn't really care. He needed to get his strength back.

* * *

><p>Kakashi's chosen location wasn't really a secret to anyone who knew him. As opposed to Gai, who trained wherever he felt like it and had several spots all around fire country, Kakashi always fell back on <em>his<em> cliff where he'd trained with Sasuke, and where many years ago his father had first taught him the summoning jutsu.

In his weakened state, it took Kakashi a lot longer to get up the mountain than usual, and once he had made the ascent, he was completely exhausted.

As a consequence, he couldn't start training right away and had no choice but to sit down on the ground and watch the sunset. It reminded him of Gai.

Disgusted with himself, he turned to face the rough, bare mountainside, willing his mind to transform into similar matter. He could be hard and cold when he had to; he'd always managed to be as tough as he needed to be. Sometimes tougher.

The first thing you learned in the academy was something Kakashi had already learned two months before he was even old enough to enter Konoha's school for future ninja: Never let your guard down.

His father had told him that, and on the same day, had given him the family's summoning contract to sign, so he'd always have someone to watch his back.

* * *

><p>Looking up at the stars, Kakashi began to question his idea; not only had he not really been able to actually train at all so far, he was also stuck in a rut of one painful memory chasing another.<p>

Kakashi shook his head, as if that would be enough to get rid of unwanted thoughts. It was night and he was tired, but before he could get any rest, he had to make sure that he was safe. Kakashi bit his thumb, formed the seals and pressed his palm on the rocky ground. Black writing snaked out from the spot where he touched the earth, spreading like a bloodstain.

When the smoke had cleared, Kakashi sent his pack out to survey the area and keep night watch. Only then did he allow himself to settle down.

He couldn't sleep; the utter silence of the mountain – no chirping crickets, no signs of life anywhere - was keeping him awake.

So Kakashi lay on his thin mat and under his equally thin blanket and tried very hard not to let his thoughts wander in that one direction. He even preferred thinking about the time he had spent with Sasuke in that very same place, teaching him the jutsu he'd later used to attack Naruto, wondering whether he would find himself on the receiving end of his own jutsu in the future.

All of this was still better than thinking about Gai, who had not in fact dropped everything to chase after him.

Maybe their "challenge" had taught Gai a lesson after all.

Or maybe it was the kiss.

Kakashi groaned and squeezed his eye shut, but that only made it easier for his brain to replay the memory of that moment on the black screen of his closed eyelid.

Someone was scratching rather insistently on his arm; Kakashi shifted away and reached blindly for his blanket to protect himself against the sudden chill.

"Hey! Wake up!"

Pakkun. Kakashi was wide awake in an instant.

"Trouble?" He asked, sitting up and grabbing his pack. The night still seemed deceptively quiet, but the way Pakkun sniffed the air was a glaring warning sign.

"Not sure yet, but someone's coming."

"Shinobi?" Kakashi pulled a kunai from his backpack, just in case. In the darkness, he could see Pakkun cock his head, his equivalent of a shrug.

"Probably, too fast for a civilian at any rate," he paused, sniffing again. "Actually, smells a lot like burnt curry. You expecting-"

"Gai." They said in unison.

Kakashi had never known that it was possible to be relieved and tense at the same time. "Thanks," he said to Pakkun, "I'll handle it from here. How far away is he?"

Naturally, Gai chose that moment to come leaping down from somewhere further up the mountain, landing right in front of Kakashi, who – and he was quite proud of that – didn't even bat an eye. Pakkun, on the other hand, only very narrowly avoided serving as Gai's landing pad and hence vanished with a scoff and the usual pop and smoke.

"Closer than you think!" Gai announced, his teeth managing a ping even in the dim starlight.

Expressing both his hipness and coolness via complete non-reaction, Kakashi let the moment ooze past, let Gai's teeth sparkle and the non-existent crickets chirp. It was a long moment.

Unfortunately, while he waited the phrase "I have kissed this man and enjoyed it" kept repeating itself over and over, followed by the even more disturbing "I want to do it again." It really was a long moment.

Finally, Gai did catch up on the fact that his entrance would not be commented on by his audience. He obviously didn't like it but had learned to deal with these kinds of disappointments. Spurned, Gai moved on to pointing a finger at Kakashi in accusation.

"Why are you camping out here? You should be in the village! You're still recovering!" Gai's voice boomed and echoed, bouncing off the rocks and down into the valley, from where a disturbed owl hooted in response.

Kakashi blinked, mostly unimpressed. "I'm not considered AWOL, am I?"

"No, but you're acting strange." He bent down to Kakashi, who was still sitting on his mat, his blanket in his lap. Kakashi didn't budge, even when Gai came closer and closer until their noses were almost touching. If he hadn't still worn his mask, he might have thought Gai was going to kiss him.

"Maybe you have a fever!" Gai exclaimed suddenly, all but slapping one hand onto Kakashi's forehead while pressing the other on his own to compare temperatures. "Hmmm, it's hard to tell." He frowned, his eyebrows seemingly trying to get out from under his hand. "I think I'm actually warmer than you."

"Gai," Kakashi said as calmly as he could. "Why did you come? It's the middle of the night." The hand was removed from his forehead and Gai straightened up, folding his arms – Kakashi told himself he was glad for the distance between them.

"I was worried! You shouldn't be out here! You were just released from the hospital!"

"I'm touched," Kakashi drawled, and he was, but he definitely wasn't going to show it. "I'm fine, though; I just needed some space."

Gai scoffed.

"I get it! You're embarrassed because our lips touched!"

Kakashi's whole body went hot, then cold. And just when he'd thought they would never actually talk about what had happened… except, what? Lips _touched_?

"I don't know what you're talking about." His voice didn't betray anything, Kakashi noted proudly.

"But it's nothing to be ashamed of!" Gai went on as if he hadn't heard Kakashi at all. "Sometimes, in a touching, tender moment, things can become quite intimate even between two men! No one needs to be ashamed! Because we are secure in our manhood!"

At this point, Kakashi was sure that his jaw would have dropped off if it hadn't been held in place by the fabric of his mask.

"And," Gai continued, oblivious to the state Kakashi was in, "I love you, Kakashi. You are like a brother to me. So you really have no reason to be ashamed." Having said that, he leaned down and put a hand on Kakashi's shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze.

It was like being punched in the stomach, like the moment when all the air got knocked out of you and you felt like you could never take another breath again.

Kakashi stared into Gai's dopey smiling face, at his cheesy thumbs-up. How could one person be so stupid?

He felt like laughing or punching Gai, or maybe both, but Kakashi was a master of self-restraint, so he just said, very evenly, "You're not my brother."

Gai's smile stayed firmly in place, but the rest of his face seemed to retreat a little upon hearing Kakashi's icicle-studded voice. "I know that," Gai laughed, pretending to be amused by Kakashi's reaction, however, his laughter came out sounding fake and tinny, "I was only comparing our relationship to –"

"It's not like that."

"But—"

"Just go back to Konoha." Finally, Gai let go of his shoulder. Even if he didn't let go of anything else.

"I cannot go and leave you here; you're clearly sick! Your face is all grey!"

"That's because it's dark, Gai. I'm not sick. Just leave me alone."

"I can't. I won't. Not as long as I'm not one hundred percent sure that you're not ill."

"I told you; I'm fine."

"I'm sorry, but that's not enough." Gai was in his super sincere mode, which told Kakashi that right now, there was no changing his mind. He might as well stop trying.

"Fine. Suit yourself. Goodnight," he said and lay down on his thin mat a little too abruptly. The ground was unforgivingly hard, even with his makeshift bed to soften the blow. Kakashi bit back a wince and wrapped himself in his blanket, turning his back to Gai, whom he could hear walking a few steps away from him before sitting down.

He tried to relax and waited for sleep to happen. It didn't. Instead Kakashi became hyperaware of every little sound Gai made. Gai breathing, Gai shifting, Gai yawning. How was anyone supposed to sleep like that?

Plus, his thoughts were magnetically drawn to Gai's accidentally touching lips shtick. He didn't know what to make of that. Was Gai really that oblivious or was he trying to spare Kakashi's feelings? Kakashi sighed, his breath raising a tiny cloud of dust from the rocky ground.

_You are like a brother to me. _

Gai was not like a brother to him. To Kakashi, Gai was everything he couldn't be, everything he couldn't have.

And thus, he continued to lie awake, floating in a sea of his own longing, listening to the small sounds that betrayed Gai's presence until exhaustion dragged him under.

end?

* * *

><p>SPOILER FOR THE LATEST CHAPTER BELOW<p>

* * *

><p>A.N.: Now that the story's premise has been officially "jossed" I wonder if I should just end it here. I know I promised a get together fic and a higher rating, but it's been dragging on forever and I feel like this might be a good place to end it. Would you guys feel cheated be mad if I left this as the final chapter?


	10. Chapter 10

The moment Kakashi woke up, he had that awful feeling that he was being watched. He turned, expecting Gai and doing a little double take when, instead of his rival's face, he found himself looking into the big, watery eyes of a large tortoise, who blinked once, very slowly, then wished him a good morning.

"Where's Gai?" Kakashi asked, not quite sure whether he was relieved or disappointed about his friend's unexpected disappearance.

"Gai went down into the valley for a refreshing morning swim." Ningame, as usual, spoke in a deliberate and grave manner, as if each and every one of his words carried an important lesson. "I was told to watch over you while you slept and to relay this message as soon as you woke up, which I have done now, so if you will excuse me—"

"You've got something there." Kakashi, who had sat up during Ningame's longwinded and self-important speech, pointed at the top of the tortoise's shell, where something white fluttered in the breeze.

He then watched the poor reptile crane his short, fairly inflexible neck and mutter under his breath for a few entertaining moments before curiosity got the better of him and he finally got up to take a closer look at the offending item.

It turned out to be a piece of paper with a note written on it. Kakashi squatted down behind Ningame to read.

_Good Morning, my Rival!_

_I hope you slept well! I have gone down into the valley to enjoy a refreshing swim in the lake! If you feel up to it, you're welcome to join me!_

_- Gai_

"Looks like you weren't supposed to give the message; you _were_ the message," Kakashi said.

"What?!" Ningame did a full turn, then another and another, trying in vain to get the paper into his beak somehow. It looked like he was chasing his little tail.

Kind of cute in a pathetic way, Kakashi thought.

"What are you waiting for?! Get it off me!" The rotating tortoise was starting to sound quite furious, so Kakashi decided to show some mercy. Being Gai's summon was probably a tough existence even without other people making fun of you. He snatched the note off Ningame's shell and showed it to him a little apologetically.

"Such insolence!" Compared to his ninken, Ningame didn't really have the means to express emotion very well; his leathery face just wasn't designed for it, but this time his eyes were practically shooting sparks. "Do I look like a notepad to you?!"

Suspecting that there really was no right answer to this loaded question and unwilling to get drawn into a fight between Gai and his reptilian companion, Kakashi settled for a sad shake of his head and wondered if he could maybe risk a comforting little pat on the tortoise's head, but decided against it. He knew how Pakkun could get if someone who wasn't Kakashi tried to pet him and he had no desire to find out how hard Ningame could bite.

With a gruff "Goodbye!" the tortoise vanished in a cloud of smoke that, to Kakashi at least, seemed slightly darker and stinkier than usual.

He sighed and took another look at the note in his hand. Gai's offensively cheerful handwriting and overuse of exclamation marks were taunting him.

The lake, was it?

If Gai had truly gone swimming… Well, most people tended to take off some of their clothes when they did that.

He knew it was an awful idea to go and tempt himself further, especially after what Gai had said to him the night before, however…

However, there was no way he could avoid seeing Gai in various states of undress for the rest of his life, so why not try to get used to it now?

* * *

><p>Getting down the mountain without much chakra to help him secure his footing was spectacularly annoying, Kakashi found. By the time he arrived in the sparse little forest that hid the lake, his knees were pincushions of pain.<p>

He was also quite aware that as exhausted as he was now, he probably wouldn't be able to master the ascent by himself when it was time to return to camp.

It couldn't be helped, he decided and followed the narrow path that lead to the lake.

* * *

><p>In the summer, the nameless lake in the centre of the forest was a great spot for swimming as it was completely surrounded by trees and therefore protected from view, as well as shadowy and hence great for cooling off on hot days.<p>

Early morning temperatures, however, were not exactly encouraging Kakashi to get into the water, considering how cold it was even on the hottest of summer days.

Gai, on the other hand, clearly didn't share that opinion.

Only a few seconds after Kakashi had practically tripped over his discarded clothes, his foot getting tangled up in spandex, he caught sight of Gai plowing through the water like some kind of very big and excited shark.

If he had had the time, he would have had second thoughts right then, and maybe decided to get back up on his mountain, or at least try to do it, but before he even managed to finish that thought, Gai reached the water's edge and stood up, grinning and glistening.

Completely naked.

It was only natural for Kakashi to follow the little streamlets of water with his eye, and gravity being what it was; it was only natural for those little streamlets to flow downwards.

Any normal person would have stayed where the water was deep enough to go up to their hips, but Gai, abnormal as ever, waded closer still, leaving nothing to the imagination.

Kakashi had to fight really hard to keep his eye trained on Gai's face. Well, it wasn't like he'd never seen it before; just having it all hanging out like that was quite disconcerting.

Gai, though, remained completely oblivious.

"Feeling better?" he asked and without even waiting for a reply added, "Come on in! It's refreshing!"

There was no way Hatake Kakashi was going to take all his clothes off. None. And he hadn't brought anything even remotely close to swimwear, and yet he'd gone down to the lake anyway, so if he wasn't going to swim, how would he explain that?

He had no choice.

Reluctantly, Kakashi began to strip off the clothes he'd slept in, the shirt and pants, but pointedly left his boxers on.

Gai raised one thick eyebrow at the sight of him stepping into the water in his underwear, and burst into annoyingly loud laughter when Kakashi hissed and cursed as the icy water sent shivers up his legs.

"It's freezing! What's wrong with you?!" In an attempt to keep himself from shaking, he wrapped his arms around his torso and gritted his teeth.

"Wait, rival, I'll lend you a helping hand!" Gai winked and came closer, putting said hand on Kakashi's shoulder.

The true meaning of his words didn't occur to Kakashi until it was far too late. Not even ninja speed could save him when Gai really grabbed him, one arm snaking around his legs long before he could react, and hoisted him up over his head as if he was a human barbell.

Knowing what was coming only made it worse.

Gai tossed him, sent him flying a good few meters until he hit the water with a splash he only half-heard before he was separated from the world above the surface and sank into the cold, murky depths.

Kakashi allowed himself to be submerged for a few heartbeats, taking refuge in the water that clouded his vision and rendered Gai invisible and inaudible as if Kakashi had plunged into a different dimension.

Sadly, he needed oxygen to live, so he couldn't stay under water and enjoy the silence for much longer; he had to swim to the shimmering surface.

He came up gasping, immediately looking for Gai, for revenge, he told himself, and nothing else.

To his annoyance, Gai was right there, in his face, ready to push Kakashi back under, ready to fight.

They wrestled in the water for dominance, for fun. Pushing each other under, then pulling each other up playfully. Kakashi caught himself laughing; he caught himself in the act of being happy and had to chastise himself for it when he did.

Like brothers. This was exactly what Gai had meant. This was exactly how Gai felt.

His nudity was meaningless and natural because Kakashi was his brother, a fellow man, whose hands never wandered into dangerous territory. No, there wasn't even any dangerous territory between them, even if hands wandered, even if Kakashi felt Gai brush against him in a way that sent different, warm shivers up and down his spine, it meant nothing to Gai because Kakashi was just his brother.

There could never be anything more between them.

* * *

><p>As soon as he was out of the water and struggling with his damp clothes, Kakashi began to sneeze, causing Gai to shoot him a concerned and vaguely guilty look.<p>

He brushed his drenched silver mat of hair out of his eye, then wiped his nose with the back of his hand. A snail's trail of thin mucus glinted wetly on his skin. Great, he was definitely getting sick.

Every tiny gust of wind that found a way through the trees made him feel as if the clothes that stuck to his body were caked in ice.

"I don't think I can make it back to the cliff," Kakashi said, too tired to play any kind of games.

Gai nodded; he didn't seem the least bit surprised, probably because he wasn't blind. "I'll carry you up; we'll get your things, then I'm taking you back to Konoha."

* * *

><p>To his shame, Kakashi must have passed out the moment he sank onto Gai's back. At least he had no clue how he'd ended up back in Konoha in his very own bed, mask-less and wearing nothing but sweatpants.<p>

Bleary eyed, he let his gaze wander across the room until he found Gai standing in the doorway with a steaming cup of something that smelled a little like tea and a lot like concentrated awfulness in his hands.

"Drink this," Gai said, pulling up a kitchen chair that had no business being in Kakashi's bedroom, and held the cup under his nose.

Kakashi sniffed and regretted it. This was on par with mouthwash-miso, maybe even worse. "What _is _that?"

He got a sparkly grin and a thumbs-up for his trouble. "My secret cure for everything that ails you! One hundred percent guaranteed to make this cold go away!"

One look from Gai to the contents of the cup – toxic green, why wasn't he surprised? – later, Kakashi had a pretty good theory on how Gai's prediction would come to pass.

"By killing me?"

"No! By curing you!" Gai glared, offended by Kakashi's distrust. "Now drink up!"

Gai was still as fast as ever, grabbing Kakashi and all but pouring the horrible liquid into his mouth in a manner of seconds, making Kakashi cough and sputter.

It tasted even worse than it smelled, foul and somehow burnt, deeply wrong, and he could feel himself gag, but Gai clamped a hand over his mouth and began to rub his back in a very distracting manner.

He managed to keep it down, just barely.

"Don't you feel better already?" Gai beamed.

"No." But even as he said it, Kakashi could feel Gai's awful concoction settle warmly in his stomach, like a soothing balm that was spread inside of him. He sank back into his pillow, avoiding Gai's eyes.

"You're good at this," he said after a moment.

"Of course I am!" Gai folded his arms and leaned back in his chair, all self-satisfaction. Then he frowned, "at what exactly?"

"Being the big brother." Above Kakashi, the ceiling was grey and unremarkable, he studied it anyway.

Next to him, Gai shifted, the aged chair creaking. "I am, aren't I?" He sounded genuinely happy about the compliment, too.

It hurt.

Pain, Kakashi remembered a lecture their teacher had given them back at the academy, is just information, sent to your brain by your nervous system. It is nothing but a warning; soon you will learn which kind of information you will need to deal with and how to ignore the other.

He knew that his heart was sending him useless information, but he had a hard time ignoring it anyway.

His thoughts drifted away, to Sasuke of all people. And to Itachi.

And Naruto.

_Naruto trying to be a brother to Sasuke… _

Kakashi shivered under his blanket. It was such a waste.

He wondered what Minato-sensei would have done in his place, remembered something he'd said once, a lifetime ago, Naruto's lifetime ago, looking at Kushina; _"She made me a better man."_

Remembered his own father, showing him a photo of his mother, _"She always fought by my side; she was so strong."_

Obito dying, asking him to protect Rin.

"Do you think," he began, uncertain and quite aware of his feverish state, "if you had been born a woman, your life would have been the same?"

Gai flat out guffawed. "What kind of a question is that, Kakashi?"

But when Kakashi just held his gaze, he sobered and scratched his chin thoughtfully. "Actually… I think it would! I'd still be a shinobi – beautiful kunoichi, I mean – and I'd still do my best to improve myself and my students every day! My ninja way has nothing to do with my gender!"

Despite the way is stomach clenched painfully, Kakashi asked his next question. He didn't even know why he wanted to know the answer; it wouldn't change anything, and yet…

"Do you think we'd still be the same if one of us had a different gender?"

Again, Gai took a moment to think it over. "Hmmm, it might be a little strange for a woman to have a male rival… It might seem unfair… Then again, everybody used to think it was impossible for me to catch up to you anyway, and I chose to aim as high as possible, so, yes, I think we would have been rivals either way!"

Kakashi nodded; he hadn't expected anything else.

Very calmly, he asked his most important question.

"Do you think you would have seen me as just a sibling if I had been a woman?"

Gai just gaped at him, struck speechless.

He ignored Gai's confusion. He had something to say and he knew he that this was the moment, the only moment, once it passed, there would never be another one. He breathed in deeply.

"Gai, you've made me stronger; you've made me a better person."

"When things get serious, you're the one I want by my side. I trust you more than anyone else."

"When I thought I'd killed you—" Kakashi bit his lip; there was no way to finish that sentence.

He tried another approach.

"If things were different—" But they weren't.

"It's painful," he said finally, smiling, thinking about Ningame going around in circles, "knowing I met the right person when _I_'m not the right person for them."


	11. Chapter 11

Gai stared at him, brows furrowed, his expression reminding Kakashi of their days at the academy when Gai would often look at the problem written on the blackboard with a disturbingly similar look on his face.

"I don't understand you at all, Kakashi!" Gai exclaimed suddenly, forcing Kakashi to dodge droplets of spit, which wasn't an easy feat for someone lying in bed as he was. "Why can't you ever just say what you mean?"

"And make it easy for you? Never," Kakashi said gravely. "Besides, it's not my fault that you're so slow." Speaking of slow, something dawned on Kakashi, painfully like being forced to look into too bright lights; the truth he now saw had a burning quality to it. "You're only here because Tsunade-sama told you to keep an eye on me, aren't you?"

Gai bristled, but, much to Kakashi's silent disappointment, no outright denial was forthcoming. "I would have come either way! I care about my rival, even though he is stubborn, difficult and strange."

That, though, was amusing. Well, just a little.

"Out of the two of us, you think _I_'m the strange one?"

"Obviously!" Gai had no sense for irony, none. Sarcasm, too, was a foreign concept to him. He was literal, almost painfully so, and whatever he said came from the heart, carried not hidden meaning and was generally the truth and nothing but. And, of course, he could look into a mirror every day and find nothing weird about the person looking back at him.

Seeing him now, so convinced of his non-strangeness and oh so proud of it, well, a man couldn't really help smiling, could he? Kakashi couldn't, anyway.

And then he thought of what Gai had just said to him again. _Brothers. _That, in its finality, would haunt him, he already knew, for a long time to come. His smile was tinged with sadness now; it had turned into the smile he always smiled when the only other option would have been crying, but that would have been Obito's kind of thing, not his. He just wasn't good at it.

Kakashi sighed. He did that a lot these days, especially when he was around Gai.

"Kakashi… You're making that face…" Gai said petulantly. "I hate it when you make that face!" He leaned closer, folding his arms across his chest. "Don't hide your pain behind a forced smile," he commanded. "A true man shows his emotions unashamedly!"

"You _would _say that." Kakashi rolled his eye theatrically, mostly because this was what they did and it would have felt weird not to. They had acquired so many little rituals and in-jokes over the years, it was almost sad. Naruto and Sakura would've made fun of that behind their backs, calling them creepy old men – and those two didn't even know the half of it.

But they'd earned it, Kakashi and Gai, they'd been through enough together.

"It's no use pretending! I know that something's wrong! I can tell; I am your rival, nobody knows you better than I do! You cannot fool me!" Gai was in full-blown rant-mode, his eyes alight with the fire of conviction; he was more than ready to launch into speeches about hot-bloodedness and passion and feelings and, most importantly, rivalries.

There were actions the situation demanded of Kakashi, to whip out a book and read and "hm-hm" his way through it without listening or to make a joke at Gai's expense, but… not today.

So instead, Kakashi pushed himself up into a sitting position, the blanket sliding down and exposing his bare chest, leaving him half-naked and very exposed, which was only fitting, considering what he was planning to do, and looked Gai in the eye.

"I guess I really can't," he said simply. Because it was time. What did he have to lose?

Kakashi thought about the days, the events that had led up to this moment and weighed his options one last time. He might have been able to get away like that, never spelling it out, and Gai would have forgotten at some point, or pretend to at least, and that would have been that. They'd go on fighting side by side, until, one day, one of them would die. And if that person was Gai, then Kakashi would just have to spend the rest of his life hating himself, which wouldn't be too different from what he was already doing.

True, he'd practically said it already, maybe Gai would put two and two together at some point and figure it out himself – hell, maybe he already had and was just trying to let Kakashi down easy. Then again, maybe he wouldn't and wasn't.

After all that had happened, after all Gai had done for him, Kakashi suddenly felt that it just wasn't enough to let time keep on passing like that. Gai deserved the truth. He'd earned it fair and square.

So Kakashi simply had to give it to him as directly as possible.

"I'm not sad," he said and he did give Gai his best smile to prove it. "I'm happy. I really am. I'm glad you picked me as your rival. I know it's not the same for you," Gai frowned at that, but Kakashi pressed on. "To you, I was always the kid you wanted to beat. I was always a challenge. And I've seen what that can do to people, but then, you were always a little different."

Kakashi took a deep breath. He knew he had to go on quickly or Gai would just interrupt and they'd get derailed again.

The next part was harder.

But Gai was looking at him and he wanted this to be a moment of complete honesty between them, no head games, no manipulation, no evasion. Not an easy task for a shinobi.

He tried anyway.

"Look, Gai, this is all there is for me." And he couldn't help but remember that poor kid, Haku, so much potential gone in one flash of lighting. Kakashi swallowed. He wasn't the emotional type, that was Gai's role, but, well, some moments demanded it. "When I die," he said and was forced to watch Gai's eyes narrowing, a million protests probably forming on his tongue as if they weren't both a hair's breadth from death every day. "When I die, I want to go where Obito and Rin are. Even if it means vanishing. Even if it means never seeing you again. I _owe_ them."

He felt the sad smile creep onto his face again. "I've got nothing to give you."

"Kakashi-"

"But that didn't keep me from falling in love with you." There. He'd said it, and now that it was out, it was actually a relief.

And there was no great clap of thunder or flash of lightening. They just remained exactly where they were. Kakashi watched Gai's eyes grow wide and he was glad, glad, that, at least, he'd finally been understood and wouldn't have to explain even further because the next logical step would have been drawing diagrams, and there was simply no way he would have been able to keep those from entering R-rated territory.

Gai still hadn't said anything. He just stared, his mouth moving silently like a stranded fish's. Kakashi had to resist the urge to wave a hand in front of his friend's face to check if he was still conscious.

In a way, he wasn't even disappointed, wasn't terribly anxious for a response because he'd never really had any hope in the first place. It had been hopeless even before Gai had told him he loved him like a brother, and, or so he told himself, it would be better that way. He'd be Gai's brother; they'd go on as they had, and Kakashi would get over it; he'd gotten over a lot worse.

At least he'd said it, that was the important part, at least he'd have one less regret.

"Kakashi…" Gai was looking at him like he'd just transformed into some kind of tailed beast , which made something in Kakashi's chest seize up unexpectedly. What if they couldn't just go back to the way things were after this? What if Gai couldn't get past this?

Kakashi frantically searched Gai's eyes for signs of repulsion, but what he found in them was such a tangled web of emotions that he couldn't possibly begin to tell them all apart.

No, he couldn't allow himself to panic now. He needed to do damage control.

"Anyway, it's probably for the better if we just forget about all this and move on from here," he said, forcing false cheer into his voice. When he noticed that, apparently, his hands were nervously wringing the edge of his blanket, he made them stop. "It's not like we don't have more important things to think about…" Distractions usually worked well on Gai; only apparently not this time because Gai continued to stare at him and said nothing.

"Na, Gai?" Kakashi prompted gently. This wasn't what he'd expected – although he had no idea what exactly he had expected, maybe for Gai to shout, "Of course you're in love with me! I'm the most handsome and virile man in Konoha!", which would have been slightly less awful than this awkward silence.

"You…" Gai swallowed the rest of his sentence and started anew. "Why didn't you tell me?"

Kakashi shrugged. "I just did."

"Grgh, you know what I mean!" It was almost comforting to be back to that, to Gai being exasperated with him. Almost. "Why didn't you tell me sooner?"

Kakashi shrugged again. Gai simply brought it out in him, he couldn't help it, but letting himself drift back into the familiar pattern now would be dangerous. He didn't want Gai to catch him off guard; he felt too vulnerable, too exposed.

"I _did_ kiss you."

Finally, Gai had enough. He jumped up out of his chair and began to pace the length of Kakashi's bed. Up and down and up and down, glaring at the floor and shooting occasional glances at Kakashi. "That wasn't a real kiss!" he said so loudly that Kakashi wondered if his neighbors would be able to hear him. Well, by now they were so used to Gai shouting his head off in Kakashi's apartment at various times of day and night, they barely even bothered to complain anymore.

"It was far too confusing!" Gai added as he came to a halt next to Kakashi who shrugged one last time.

"I'm sorry, I'll try to be clearer next time—" No, this wasn't the way he wanted this to go, not like a joke. And there wouldn't be a next time, he told himself firmly, that had been established by now, hadn't it? Gai was confused and angry, mostly angry, not happy, not even flattered. Well, Kakashi had been prepared for rejection so he wasn't disappointed, he certainly wasn't hurt. But still, he wanted to be clear.

"Look, it's like I said. I don't expect you to—" Reciprocate his feelings? That had never been a possibility, so why even say it? "You don't have to stay," Kakashi said instead, and he did want Gai to leave, he realized. It would make things a lot easier. "I just wanted to tell you as long as I still had the chance; I've let too many of those slip through my fingers." _Obito, Rin, Minato-sensei, Sasuke, although there might be hope for _him _yet._ Kakashi looked up into Gai's stormy eyes. "With everything we might be facing soon, I thought I'd better take this chance – I wanted you to know, that's all." And that was all; they were done. "I hope we can still—"

"Stop." Gai loomed over him, arms folded again, casting a long, sinister shadow. His thick, furrowed brows made him look like a villain in some cheap drama "What are you doing?!" he boomed. "You sound like an old man on his deathbed! I can't listen to this!" Before Kakashi knew it, Gai had bent down to grab hold of his bare shoulders, since he was standing next to the bed, the angle was a little weird, but, as usual, that wasn't enough to deter Gai.

"Whatever happens, we're going to win, Kakashi!" he shouted right into Kakashi's face, all sparkly teeth, fiery eyes and minty breath. Kakashi had nowhere to run, not that he really wanted to, but he could feel his heart beating against his ribcage like a desperate prisoner pounding the iron bars that hold him captive. The warmth from Gai's hands seeped right into his shoulders, into his belly; Kakashi wanted to soak in it. "Like I'd ever let you lose!" It was the collective renewal of a million old promises.

"Gai—" _Don't_, Kakashi wanted to say, _don't give me false hope_. He felt the hurt, the heartbreak building in his chest.

"Wipe that look off your face, Kakashi." Gai's voice was softer now and he'd moved closer. Too close. "Because I hate it. I hate seeing you in pain."

Gai's hands were still on his shoulders; they were big and strong, as familiar to Kakashi as his own, and it felt like they were holding him together.

He'd promised himself to be honest, though, to do what had to be done, regardless of what he wanted.

"I meant what I said earlier." This was his last warning, for both their sakes he hoped Gai would heed it. "I can't give you anything. And, outside of Icha Icha, I don't believe in happy endings."

It was hard to keep his eye from darting to Gai's lips. He could feel Gai's warm breath on his face; he wanted to feel it everywhere on his skin.

"I don't care," Gai said. "We're still at the beginning, and I don't believe in endings."

Kakashi felt his heart jump into his throat, just hearing that, just having Gai this close, looking at him like that, with such honesty and wholehearted devotion –

But he'd never doubted that Gai loved him. That had never been the issue. Gai was so full of love, he couldn't help but throw it at everyone around him lest he explode from the sheer amount he carried in his heart. There probably wasn't a single person in Konoha Gai _didn't_ love.

"Is _this _really what you want?" _Me,_ he thought, _am _I_ really what you want?_ Because that was what it came down to in the end.

"I don't know." Gai was honest, Kakashi had to respect him for that, even though the answer made his throat tighten with fierce disillusionment. _There's no hope._ _Why even try? Why risk it?_ _Better to back away while there's still time._

And he was about to take his own advice, to gently – reluctantly – withdraw and slip out of Gai's grip, when he felt Gai's fingers tighten around his shoulders, his thumbs stroking Kakashi's bare skin in a way that sent thunderous echoes of sensation reverberating through his whole body.

"If you love me, Kakashi, you can't just give up, you have to fight." Gai's pupils were matching pools of complete, _unsettling_ darkness. Kakashi wondered what they were seeing, how Gai was perceiving him, _this._ All this time, for all their differences, in battle it had always seemed like they were perfectly attuned to each other. Maybe he'd been wrong all this time, maybe they couldn't even see each other for what they really were. Maybe they weren't speaking the same language at all.

Either way, Gai had the wrong idea; again or still? Did it really matter? Kakashi had to stop this before it got out of hand. "Gai, this isn't something you can force," he said and he did his best to keep the sadness out of his voice. "I don't want you to—"

He was cut off by Gai's mouth clashing with his. Gai's kiss was an onslaught. It was awkward, clearly spontaneous, unplanned. It was Gai running headfirst into a wall, it was Gai taking on the biggest enemy without knowing anything about him just because he was the biggest, it was Gai ripping his gates open without thinking twice, it was _Gai._

It took Kakashi half a second to get his bearings and by then Gai had gently shifted to make things a little smoother, one of his hands moving from his shoulder up his neck and into his hair, his head tilting to keep their noses from bumping. All Kakashi was able to do was close his eye and sink into the warmth of Gai's lips. His thoughts were buzzing in his head like a dying insect before fizzing out completely.

It was over too quickly, but then, even if it had lasted for hours, it would still have been over too quickly for Kakashi, who wanted nothing more than to catch Gai's lips in another kiss, to pull him down into the bed. Instead Kakashi, arousal coursing through his body like an electrical current, held back and waited for Gai to catch his breath.

Gai withdrew slowly, his hand retaking its old spot on Kakashi's shoulder in one long caress that sent shivers racing down his spine.

And they were back to looking at each other; Gai smiled, and that was enough to make Kakashi's heart pick up its pace again.

"You're a part of me." Gai's voice settled in Kakashi's stomach just like his strange concoction had earlier. "I won't lose you."

"Does that mean you'll stay the night?" Kakashi schooled his voice into a completely neutral tone. He wasn't trying to seduce Gai, to manipulate him in any way. His only goal was to find out what Gai actually wanted, and if he had to swallow his heart to do so, then so be it.

He could feel the question change atmosphere in the room.

Gai let go of his shoulders and sat down next to him on the bed. His face was pensive, his shadowed profile outlined sharply against the dim light behind him. He was looking at the desk, probably without really seeing it.

The sight of him made Kakashi's heart sink. He was starting to feel cold, too, sitting around half-naked as he was.

"Gai, there's no point if—" he hesitated. Gai turned around and gave him a quizzical look. "You love me as a friend; I get it." It took almost no effort to say it; it didn't hurt that much. "It's no big deal."

"I'll stay the night," Gai said simply, "and it is a very big deal."

There was something Kakashi wanted to say to that, maybe he wanted to ask a question, maybe he should have—

But then Gai kissed him again, warm and sure, and his thoughts and doubts dissolved before they could ever reach his tongue.

End.

* * *

><p>A.N.: There is going to be an epilogue at some point (to wrap up the chuunin exam storyline and to get another look at how the relationship between the two develops), but due to rl it might be some time. My apologies.<p> 


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